


Black and Gold

by Timid_Timbuktu



Category: Kings
Genre: Angst, Internalized Homophobia, International relationships and war, M/M, Romance, Self-Loathing Jack, Slow Build, explicit content, not-pure David
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-26
Updated: 2014-09-01
Packaged: 2018-01-25 19:57:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 22
Words: 98,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1660604
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Timid_Timbuktu/pseuds/Timid_Timbuktu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jack’s prison is not the palace or his fiancee's company. The prison is his mind. And after three months alone with his thoughts, he’d do anything to escape, even follow David Shepherd into Gath.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A silhouette and nothing more

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: This story is told from Jack’s perspective and therefore does contain elements of his self-loathing, especially toward his sexuality. However, I am not condoning internalized homophobia or homophobic slurs.
> 
> I am currently editing this and trying to rid it of all typos and grammatical issues.
> 
> Story title from Sam Sparro's "Black and Gold."  
> Chapter title from Bastille's "These Streets."

Jack doesn’t expect the king to change his mind. He’s given up on receiving affection from that parent, but his mother? He pins his hope on her like a medal and waits. She’s been angry and disappointed in Jack before, but it never lasts. She always comes back to tend his wounds, to hold him as he cries, and to love him.

_But what about all of the times she held the knife that made the wound, Jack?_

He can’t stop the traitorous thoughts, complete sentences that he doesn’t even realize he thinks until they are in his mind. He supposes that he is going crazy. He talks to himself like he’s two people, long conversations and arguments between one part of his head and the other. It takes six weeks for him to realize that the two warring sections of his brain are the logical part and the emotional part. It takes another six weeks for him to realize that his brain has always been separated into this dichotomy. He has always been at war inside himself about what he should feel, what he should think.

Who he should fuck.

 _Who I should fuck._ That has always been the heart of this internal battle. And it began…

When did it begin?

When he was eighteen and he finally got up the nerve (and drank enough vodka) to suck a man’s cock, reveling in the power he felt being on his knees, pulling a man apart with just his tongue and his lips?

When he was fourteen and he first allowed himself to jerk off to the thought of another boy’s angular and hard body underneath him, so unlike the soft curves of a girl?

It was when he was ten and he had planted a quick chaste kiss on his best friend’s mouth. Thomas had punched him in the cheek the second Jack pulled back, still too young to remember that Jack was a prince. Of course Jack had cried and run to his mother, without thinking of the consequences. Because like Thomas, Jack was still too young to remember that he was the prince sometimes, too. His mother had marched Jack out to the castle grounds where Thomas was sitting on the grass blowing the seeds from dead dandelions. Fury in her eyes, she had asked Thomas why he’d hit the prince.

The prince, that’s what she’d called Jack, not his name, but _the prince._ It was the moment dread had pooled in Jack’s stomach, when he’d realized that maybe he should have just laughed it off like it was a joke and dragged Thomas down to the beach to play.

“Because he kissed me,” Thomas had replied, cheeks red with embarrassment, unable to look the queen in the eyes, but also too brave and honest to lie. That was why Jack had had a crush on him in the first place and he was overcome with the sudden urge to kiss Thomas again. Because, God, he was beautiful, blonde hair glinting in the sun, green eyes defiant but still cast down, away from the queen and Jack…no, not Jack, _the prince._

But the spell had broken when the queen slapped Thomas, so hard he fell onto the grass. Jack looked at her for the first time, really looked at her. She was shaking with rage, eyes wide and livid and it was all directed toward Thomas.

“Never besmirch the name of the prince, you little ingrate.”

“Mother.” Jack had reached for her hand pulling her toward him until her eyes had focused on him. Then he was in the eye of the storm, terrified and completely in awe of Thomas for facing down the raging queen. Jack stepped back and mumbled, “Please don’t. It was a misunderstanding. It didn’t even hurt that much.”

“A misunderstanding?” His mother’s voice had been hollow and deadly. “Tell me what really happened, Jack. Tell me why he _really_ hit you.”

Jack furrowed his brow, confused and terrified and he opened his mouth to say, _Because I kissed him. He already told you that._

But he knew what his mother wanted. Thomas had been wrong to punch the prince, but not as wrong as Jack had been to kiss him in the first place. In that moment Jack realized that he was nothing but wrong, all of the way to his soul…for wanting Thomas, for not even understanding what it meant to want someone, but for wanting him all the same. And somehow he knew that no matter how angry his mother would be at him, she would blame Thomas for this. She would do anything to silence him, because what Jack had done was wrong.

Jack was wrong.

“Mother, please.” His voice was shaking and he glanced quickly at Thomas, seeing his best friend’s face finally filled with fear, no longer stupidly brave. “I didn’t kiss him. He’s just mad at me for what I said and he made up that stupid _lie_ to get back at me.”

The queen’s arm relaxed slightly under Jack’s touch. “And what did you say, Jack?”

“I…” Jack’s mind reeled, a dozen different lies cascading through his brain until he picked one. He was becoming good at lying. “I said something I shouldn’t have about his sister.”

The queen quirked her head and Thomas’ eyes narrowed. “What did you say about Emilia?”

Jack pulled his hand from his mother’s arm and tried to act embarrassed, laughing uncomfortably. Yes, he was becoming alarmingly good at lying. “It was about her girl parts. I said…I…I said I was…going to…hold her down and kiss them.”

The last part came out in a rush of genuine embarrassment, because it seemed disgusting and absurd. Why would he ever want to do such a thing? But Jack had heard the other boys talk. He knew how, in just the past year, they’d started talking about “girls’ boobs,” even though none of the girls even had them yet. He hadn’t understood these conversations, so he had just smirked and gone along with it. But he knew what _normal_ boys wanted, boys who weren’t disgusting and wrong from skin to soul like him.

His mother let out an exasperated breath. “Jack, it is not appropriate for a prince to speak of such crude things. You won’t to it again.”

But she didn’t sound angry, just…relieved. Jack wanted to run to his room and cry.

The queen had reprimanded Thomas, had threatened him if he ever spread slander like that about the prince again. And Jack had thought that everything was better. He’d saved his best friend and everything could simply go back to the way it had been before. Thomas would forget about the kiss and they could continue playing hide-and-seek and war and croquet on the palace grounds for years to come.

But of course, Thomas had been shipped off to a boarding school a hundred of miles away the following week and Jack had never seen him again.

Despite Jack’s youth, he’d known exactly who had sent Thomas away and why.

Standing alone in the castle garden the following month, blowing seeds from a dandelion and imagining how Thomas’ lips looked, Jack had promised himself that he would never kiss a boy again. He’d kept that promise until the age of seventeen when the promise had turned into _I’ll never tell anyone about kissing these boys,_ because after he’d found Stephen and Adam and Aaron and Gabriel and finally Eli, the thought of never kissing a boy again felt a little bit like dying.

* * *

After three months in his prison, Jack begins to wonder if his mother had Joseph killed, the thought so disturbingly plausible that he can’t believe it took him so long to wonder. He rips his medals off his military jacket, which is hanging in the closet for some unknown reason, and throws them across the room. It is the first step in a twenty minute tantrum that ends with broken vases and overturned furniture, bloody knuckles from punching the dresser and the wall, and Lucinda crying and shaking on the bed, trying to avoid Jack’s wrath like one would a caged lion.

Lucinda has given up trying to seduce Jack, but she still treats him with adoration and love. She’s still blind to the blackness that lives in his soul. For the first time he is glad for her presence, seeing her terrified eyes and knowing that he’s finally destroyed her idiotic love for him. At least that is a relief as he sinks to his knees, knuckles bleeding and begins to cry.

* * *

The next day, Andrew arrives. The king removed Lucinda “for her safety” after Jack’s little tantrum. He wonders why he didn’t trash the room earlier if that was all it took to get some fucking privacy.

But then, Andrew arrives, and Jack wishes Lucinda would come back. He laughs at the absurdity of it, that there is still someone in the world who is more annoying than her. Of course, Andrew responds to Jack’s random laughter by narrowing his eyes and tilting his head in just the way that annoys Jack the most. Which only makes him laugh harder. Crazy, completely off-kilter laughter. He really is going insane.

“Are you alright?” Andrew asks. What a fucking idiot. Is Jack alright?

“Never better,” Jack says with a smirk.

“I shouldn’t be here,” Andrew states, sitting on the window seat and propping his legs up. Getting comfortable for a long stay. Great.

“You could always leave,” Jack replies, staying near the door and crossing his arms. “I wouldn’t stop you.”

“Oh, but you want me to stay, Jack, you just don’t know it yet.”

And this is why Jack can’t stand his long-winded snake of a cousin. Andrew loves to speak but he never says anything. Or maybe it is just that infuriating smirk that drives Jack crazy.

“And why’s that?” Jack asks, voice low and obviously annoyed. And yet five minutes and a bunch of needless sentences later and Andrew still hasn’t gotten to the point. Jack sighs and falls onto the bed, gazing up at the ceiling and thinking that Silas really has outdone himself this time. Lucinda was little league compared to Andrew, who is surely Jack’s new brand of punishment.

He’s tuned Andrew out for so long, it almost doesn’t register when Andrew says, “Your sister’s gone missing.”

There is an awkward lull in the one-sided conversation. Jack realizes that the silence means it’s his turn to speak, but what was Andrew saying? He goes through Andrew’s last few sentences in his head, sitting up sharply when the last one sinks in.

“What do you mean, Michelle’s missing?”

“It happened last week. I knew no one would tell you and I was trying to figure out how to speak to you alone.” Andrew gestures to the destroyed apartment. “Thankfully you figured that part out for me.”

“You know they have eyes on me here.”

“The cameras are disabled,” Andrew replies with a flick of the hand.

Jack’s mind goes into overdrive. The cameras are out? His chance is now. If only he can get to the gun that Andrew has hidden in his boot. Jack noticed it immediately, the bulge in Andrew’s right pant leg just a little too pronounced as it rests on his boot. Andrew probably thinks he is being sneaky, or he is smart enough to know that he shouldn’t be alone with Jack without protection. But Andrew was never in the military. He doesn’t understand that Jack was trained to see such things.

Jack’s heart is hammering but he manages to keep his voice steady.

“How can a princess go missing from the palace?”

Andrew noticeably jerks in confusion. “Palace? Your sister’s not…oh, wow,” he chuckles, obnoxious little twit. “Your sister has been in exile for the past three months, just like you, but more like my exile than this.”

“Where?”

Andrew shrugs. Of course he doesn’t know where, only the king would know that.

“But that isn’t even the good part,” Andrew pauses before continuing, his voice dripping with condescension. “Do you want to know what the good part is, Jack?”

“Do you want me to beg you?” Jack asks, unable to hide the pure loathing in his voice.

Andrew smiles. “You mean on your knees, supplicant, begging for all the family secrets you are no longer privy to? It’s tempting. I’ve heard you’re good on your knees.”

Jack’s stomach drops and he almost jumps across the room to beat Andrew’s face in. Had everyone known that he was gay? He’d thought that he was hiding it all of those years, but it was probably unrealistic to fuck dozens of men and think he could keep it a secret.

Jack doesn’t reply, doesn’t react. He sits on the bed glowering, until Andrew starts laughing in earnest.

“Jack, you’re too easy and too much fun, but I don’t go in for that sort of thing…men or my cousins. I’m not a _pervert_ like some people.”

“Are you done? Because you better leave before I beat you to death,” Jack says, so low and honest that Andrew actually stops chuckling.

“But I haven’t told you the best part.”

“I don’t care.”

“But you should, because I saw those naked pictures of your holier-than-thou sister taken by that holier-than-thou little prick you are so in love with, you know, David Shepherd.”

Jack narrows his eyes, holding the murderous rage just beneath the skin. It is a palpable thing, coursing through his body, winding him into a fury. He wants to rip Andrew’s face off.

“What you don’t know about that night that I do, Jack, is that your sister…is carrying his child.”

The room starts spinning and Jack lurches forward, instantly nauseated. Somewhere through the fog, Jack hears Andrew speaking but he can’t make out the words. David Shepherd’s bastard is growing inside his sister? Even if Jack’s chances of being king hadn’t evaporated with that coup, they are gone with this news.

 _Not that I care,_ he thinks, surprised to find that he means it.

The moment when Jack had realized that God didn’t believe in him, that God never wanted him to be king, he’d felt his soul ripping apart. He’d felt destroyed, standing on the steps of the palace, watching his uncle flee. He had truly wanted to die. That was why he’d turned back to face his father’s judgment. And if he’d gotten his wish and died that day, he would have died never realizing that there is a freedom beneath all of the pain. He will never be king, but that also means he is finally free to be himself. He can try to make Joseph proud.

Of course, he has to escape this demented prison first.

His vision snaps into focus and time slows, like being on the battlefield in a firefight. He sees every detail of his surroundings, the splintered wood of a broken chair by the fireplace, the shards of a vase, sprinkled on the floor, Andrew still talking as he sits carefree and forever smirking by the window.

“Shut. The. Fuck. Up,” Jack says, enunciating each word, pleased when Andrew actually shuts the fuck up. They’ve always disliked each other, but their relationship was a game, smiling but with too many teeth, saying kind words but with too much bite. It has always been artifice, like all of Jack’s relationships.

“Excuse me?” Andrew says.

Jack rises from the bed and stalks toward him. “I said ‘shut the fuck up’ you scrawny little psychopath.”

Andrew’s eyes dance with glee and, oh, it feels amazing to know that soon that glee will be beaten into the carpet by Jack’s fists.

“Jack, this is refreshing. I like you better this way.”

“Enjoy it while you can because you won’t win this,” Jack continues to take slow purposeful steps toward Andrew.

“Seriously, you think I didn’t come prepared?” Andrew smirks, his hand twitching slightly as he obviously considers going for the gun hidden in his boot. He really thinks Jack doesn’t know about the gun? This is going to be way too much fun.

“Of course you came prepared, cousin.” Jack smiles and licks his lips. “I’m counting on it.”

Jack lunges and he is too quick for the asshole who has never been in a real fight. Jack’s body slams into Andrew, his hands grasping the smaller man’s shoulders, spinning him from the window seat and onto the floor. Jack straddles him, quickly pinning Andrew’s arms with his legs, leaving both of his hands wonderfully free to punch. And he does punch and punch and punch, disregarding the pleas and sobs that are spewing from his cousin.

“Beg me to stop, you little fuck, beg me,” he hisses, and Andrew breaks so easily, like a thin reed in the wind, and begs. But Jack doesn’t stop. He punches him even harder, in the chest and the stomach and the face, relishing how Andrew writhes beneath him. The only thing better than beating up an asshole is having sex with a beautiful man, and since Jack hasn’t had the pleasure of either in months, he lets himself drown in the release of fists painfully connecting with bone and flesh.

The scraping of a key in the door pulls Jack out of his violent reverie. The guards, there are always two, and of course they would have heard the scuffle. Jack pulls the revolver from Andrew’s boot, checks the cylinder. Six bullets, thank God. He stands up, leaving Andrew’s limp body on the ground. He jumps behind the bed, aiming the gun as the door creaks open. It has been years since he’s shot a revolver. They are versatile and powerful, especially at close range, but not accurate. He takes a deep breath as the first guard enters and puts a bullet straight through his forehead.

As expected, the second guard doesn’t enter the room and Jack can hear him calling for back up as Andrew still lies on the floor whimpering.

_It’s now or never, Jack, the guard will hesitate because it’s you, and that’s all you need. You have to go now._

Jack rises, gun still trained on the open door, tiptoes past the bleeding mess that is his cousin and stops a foot from the exit. He listens for the guard, but he’s stopped talking. Jack thinks back to his earlier call for back up. His voice had come from the…left. Jack steps over the dead guard’s body, through the door, swiveling to the left, and finds a handgun pointed directly at his face.

But he is the prince. Traitor, prisoner, pervert, it doesn’t matter because Jack is also the prince, so the guard hesitates. Jack will regret having to kill both of them later, they were merely doing their jobs, but there isn’t time for that now. The call for back up is in and this is his only chance to escape.

Jack flees.


	2. Lead by your beating heart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from Bastille's "Laura Palmer."

Jack is nursing a whisky in a bar in Calvary, a tiny town in the disputed territory north of the Prosperity River. He hadn’t known anything of the outside world during his palace imprisonment, but during the past two months on the run, he has learned of the war.

Information in Gilboa had obviously been doctored, but he’d crossed the Prosperity River last month and pieced it together from old newspapers and gossip in bars.

As Jack had suspected, King Silas had signed a treaty with Gath before marching into Shiloh with the Goliaths at his back. In exchange for the tanks, Silas had promised to give the land north of the Prosperity River to Gath.

On the very night of Jack’s imprisonment, David fled Shiloh, after which he simply vanished for two months, no pictures, no news reports. Then three months ago, a blurry, black & white picture of David Shepherd beside Premier Shaw of Gath appeared in the Gilboa newspaper under the headline:  **TRAITOR SHEPHERD ALIGNED WITH ENEMY.**  When the headline ran, Jack still had another month of imprisonment to endure, completely unaware that a war was about to erupt merely because of that photo.

Silas’ anger had been tangible and he’d insisted that Gath return David to Gilboa to stand trial for treason…again. Jack couldn’t believe it. Hadn’t that failed miserably the first time and didn’t the public still love David Shepherd? It was political suicide, but Silas’ hatred apparently ran too deep for reason.

The situation had quickly come to a head in Port Prosperity, David’s hometown, when Gilboan troops had managed to apprehend David. Thankfully, the people of Port Prosperity had staged a guerilla attack to save him. Jack had watched the footage of the event in a library and of course David was pleading with his townspeople to stop, because nobody else should have to die for him. He was willing to accept his fate.

That was when the Goliaths had rolled in.

This land belongs to Gath now, but Silas isn’t going to give it up without a fight. Jack knows it has nothing to do with the land, this strip of farmland means nothing to Silas except that it is David’s homeland and if he is to destroy David, he must also destroy his home.

After traveling through this region for the past few weeks in search of David, Jack has learned that the townspeople of Corinth, Port Prosperity, Calvary and New Hope no longer identify themselves as Gilboan. He has heard many of them call this David’s Land. They are loyal to him and only him. Jack wishes he could have seen Silas’ face the first time he’d heard that phrase uttered, _David’s Land._ They never state it explicitly but Jack can see the subtext, so he knows that Silas would see it too. This is David’s Land and these people, they are _David’s People._

The last piece of news from David is now eight weeks old, just a few days after Jack’s escape from Shiloh. David had stupidly charged into a firefight to save some men and been rewarded with bullet in the thigh. After that the trail goes cold.

In his darker moments, Jack’s heart fills with enough hatred that Silas and Rose aren’t a big enough target, and it spills onto David and Michelle and Joseph, people who don’t deserve it. In these moments, he wonders how David feels about all of the men who have died because of him, because he put Silas back on the throne. He wonders if David finally regrets betraying him.

 _Don’t,_  the other part of his brain says. He still talks to himself like this because he is more alone now than he was in the palace with Lucinda. _You were not in control, Jack. It was your uncle who was in control and he did not want peace._

He senses the man sitting down on the barstool next to him but doesn’t look up. He hunches down, shielding his face with the baseball cap he stole from a bum on his way out of Shiloh. He despises baseball caps, “fashion” accessories fit only for frat boys who can’t be bothered to comb their hair.

“I never thought I’d say this,” the man says quietly. Jack instantly stops breathing. “But the beard works on you.”

Jack rubs his beard absentmindedly. He hasn’t shaved in about eight weeks. On the run, he’d needed to look nothing like Jack Benjamin and a scraggly beard and slightly shaggy hair had seemed the easiest disguise. He doesn’t mind the longer hair, but the beard is just itchy.

“I didn’t know you bent that way, Shepherd,” Jack murmurs, trying and failing to keep his voice calm, forcing himself not to look up into the golden boy’s bright blue eyes for fear that he’ll lose the ability to speak.

“Charming as always,” David mutters. “Just tell me how long I have before his men pop in to shoot me, or handcuff me, or whatever they plan to do.”

“ _His_ men?” Jack asks twirling the whisky glass on the bar.

“Your father’s men,” David replies, his voice abnormally tight and annoyed.

Chuckling darkly Jack turns to David, irritated when his heart speeds up at the sight of him, still so fucking blond and perfect.

“Last time we saw each other,” Jack says, low and clipped, “I was being hauled away by _my father’s men_ for ‘a fate worse than death,’ and you were standing next to that worthless piece of shit after helping him reclaim his throne…from me.”

“I remember,” David replies, no hint of remorse in his voice. What had Jack been thinking? It was like he’d temporarily forgotten what a self-righteous asshole David was? Locked in his royal prison cell, figuring out a new way to avoid fucking Lucinda every night (and failing on occasion), he’d apparently gone crazy in the head or soft…or desperate.

Jack downs the rest of the whisky in one gulp, relishing the burn in his throat, “Forget it,” he mutters and stands up, turning to leave.

“Jack.” David’s hand is on his shoulder, light and calm, not a threat just a request for Jack to stay. Jack tilts his head up, staring the golden boy down with a look he mastered long ago, a look that says, _You’re beneath me and you barely have my attention but go ahead and speak if you dare._

Of course the look doesn’t work on David.

“You’re his son,” David says, clearly not intimidated. Jack sighs and schools his face into boredom, his eyebrow slightly raised. If he doesn’t act bored, he’ll probably punch David and make a scene about how Silas isn’t his father, not anymore, he has no fucking family…except Michelle, of course. That’s why he is here after all, not because he missed David Shepherd. Never again would he miss the asshole who has always chosen Silas over him, even after Jack saved David from Silas’ firing squad. What the hell had Jack been thinking, placing all of his hope on David, sneaking into Gath to find him?

“It’s been almost five months and you’re his son. I know you’re probably back in his good graces so he sent you here as the lure. It’s obvious that you were trying to find me. I’ve been watching you for a week.”

“A week? Well, thanks for waiting so long to say ‘hello.’” Jack tries for sarcastic ennui but it comes out as bitter and slightly whiny. God, he hates himself sometimes, but not as much as he hates David Shepherd.

“So you aren’t the lure meant to drag me out into the open?”

Where there would have been a hint of naïve hope in David’s voice before, now he just sounds tired. Apparently, the Benjamins have finally done it, made David Shepherd view the world through a lens of disbelief and distrust. How many times had Jack longed for this moment, seeing David tarnished by them? Now it just feels like the ultimate disappointment that not even David was strong enough, that the Benjamins were stronger.

“Wouldn’t my sister make a better lure?” Jack asks, curious to read David’s reaction. Maybe he doesn’t know about Michelle’s exile…or the baby.

“Haven’t you ever gone fishing?” It is obviously rhetorical, so Jack just rolls his eyes. “A good lure is something beautiful but unexpected. A good lure uses the prey’s own curiosity against it. Michelle is too obvious. Plus she’d never do it.”

“And I would?” Jack feels an odd mixture of annoyance and giddiness, because despite David's lack of faith in him, he also just called Jack “beautiful,” in a roundabout way.

David smiles slightly and tilts his head. _I guess that’s a ‘yes.’_

The giddiness dissolves.

“Why are you here then, Jack?” David asks, the kindness returning to his voice as he finally lets go of Jack’s arm. Jack tries to ignore how cold he feels without the heat of David’s touch. Even through the shirt’s fabric, David’s touch was like a furnace…or the fucking sun.

“I don’t know.” He shakes his head. “It was a mistake. I’ll go.”

He throws some Gath money on the bar and tries to ignore the way David’s body deflates as he turns to leave. So, that’s it? His cold, dirty trek across Gilboa, sleeping in the woods, mindful of every noise, constantly on alert and looking over his shoulder, stealing and looking like a hobo, it has all been for nothing. David is not the golden child sent by God to save Gilboa. He is just another paranoid man, corrupted by power. But what had Jack expected. Scratch the surface and the world is only deceit and lies and backstabbing. He blames himself for his momentary lapse into optimism. What a fucking joke.

He walks toward the door, slowly enough that David can stop him.  _Pathetic,_  he thinks and speeds up, careening out of the door and into the sunlight. He doesn’t stop or look back. He tries not to hope that David is following him, that any second he will feel that too-warm hand clasp his arm to pull him back.

“Jack.” He hears David’s voice and his footsteps in the dirt as he trots behind him. “Jack, stop.”

It is so satisfying to be chased, and by David Shepherd of all people, that Jack can’t help the smile that flits across his face. He doesn’t look back, but he slows down.

A gunshot slices through the air, violent and loud. Instinct makes Jack reach for his belt, for a gun that he doesn’t have. A second crack and he turns back toward David, only six feet away, clutching his stomach and falling back toward the ground. Flashes of the night raid whip through Jack’s mind, before Jack even knew David, the men of his unit being gunned down in the darkness, warm blood gushing out of a private’s stomach as Jack pressed his hands into the wound.

Jack jolts back to the present because men are descending on them from all directions, the bar, the woods. Jack lunges for David as a third shot rings out. The pain of the bullet as it hits his shoulder barely registers. He is all adrenaline, focused entirely on David, who seems to be falling in slow motion. When his body finally hits, pain blossoms in his eyes and then Jack’s body is over him, shielding him. At least a dozen men are moving on them, semi-automatics in hand. He covers as much of David’s trembling body as he can and pushes his face into David’s neck, closing his eyes and praying that the end is quick.

“Jack,” David murmurs from underneath him.

“Shh.” Jack lifts his head to look at David, because he wants to be brave for them in their last moments. David’s eyes are clear and unfathomable as Jack gazes into them…and still too beautiful for words. David seems confused but not dying and his focus quickly shifts to the men surrounding them. The men have formed a circle around them, their guns pointed outward as they make a protective barrier between the sniper and David.

“Mason,” David says, his voice still pained, “report.”

“Two snipers, one from the west behind the bank and one from the woods. We have to move now, back to the bar, keep your head down.”

David grabs Jack’s arm and pulls him toward the bar as the other men move with them, forming a protective wall and firing shots at the snipers. They stumble into the establishment. David lurches slightly and falls onto his knees as Jack kneels beside him.

“They are already on the move.” David’s voice is pained again. “Get them before they escape.”

Six of the men wordlessly jump at his command. No matter where he goes people love him, people follow him. But Jack is too confused and concerned to feel the usual pang of jealousy. He rips David’s jacket open.

“Kevlar,” Jack murmurs as his fingers dance over the bullet-proof vest covering David’s chest. “You wear this all the time now?”

“No, just when you’re visiting,” David replies with a slight smile. “Might stop the bullet, but it sure as hell doesn’t stop the pain.”

David glances at Jack’s shoulder, growing instantly sober. “You’re bleeding.”

“What?” Jack looks down. “Guess I caught one back there.”

“Montgomery,” David yells, getting to his feet while still holding his stomach. “I need you to tend to Major Benjamin’s wound _now_.”

David turns away to talk to his men as Montgomery kneels beside Jack. Already, Jack can feel the darkness seeping in, not from blood-loss (the wound is minor), but from losing David’s attention even for a moment. Usually he hates David for making him feel like this, making him long for something that is absurd and beneath him. But with his body still humming with adrenaline, now he just wishes he was worthy of David’s light. He wishes that he wasn’t the dark, perverted pit of wrong that he has always known himself to be, ever since the day he kissed Thomas.

He is the one beneath David, not the other way around, and he probably knew it even when he was the crown prince and David was just a lowly country boy. That was probably why he’d hated David from their very first meeting, because he didn’t hate David at all. In fact David was exactly his type, not the type of anonymous boy he blew in the backroom of a club, but the type of boy he stupidly fell in love with. Thomas, Eli, Joseph, they’d all been sweet and golden.

Except David isn’t sweet, exactly, not like Joseph who was soft and pliable, easily controlled and hurt by Jack. David is strong and determined, filled with conviction and he’s never been afraid of Jack. It’s annoying and intoxicating. He’s the only righteous do-gooder Jack has ever known who doesn’t bend to Jack’s will.

Jack wants nothing more than to drag David’s bright shining soul into the darkness of his own.

As if Jack ever could. As if Jack is the stronger one.

He wonders what David would think if he knew how Jack really thinks of him. All of the times Jack has imagined pushing David against a wall, running his tongue up David’s neck, capturing his mouth in a possessive kiss, all lips and teeth and smothered moans. And he’s imagined it a lot, more times than he wants to admit. Watching David speak to his men, confident and strong and downright fucking _perfect,_ Jack feels wrong for even imagining it, for thinking of God’s chosen spread out beneath him naked and begging.

Too lost in thought, Jack doesn’t notice when Montgomery strips off his jacket and shirt, but the sting of antiseptic on his wound brings him back to the present. Hissing and dropping his head to the wooden floor of the bar, he mutters, “Is the bullet still in?”

“No, it went through cleanly and it didn’t hit your clavicle or an artery. Lucky you.”

Montgomery seems almost annoyed, like he’d rather let Jack bleed out. Jack raises his head to find Montgomery glowering at him as he continues to clean the flesh. David’s radiant head appears above Montgomery, smiling down at Jack.

“You like jumping in front of bullets for people you hate, don’t you?” he asks.

“I don’t hate you,” Jack replies without thinking. Silas is obviously the other person David is referring to, so Jack lets it remain unspoken but obvious, _I do hate Silas_.

The corner of David’s mouth tilts up. “You also like jumping in front of bullets even when you are the one who orchestrated the shooting.”

Jack sits up too quickly, hissing as pain jolts through his shoulder. Montgomery curses at him, telling him to sit still as he begins to wrap the wound.

“Pretense doesn’t become you, Shepherd, so how about you just say what you are thinking?”

Without skipping a beat, David answers, “You engineered the assassination attempt on Silas, along with your uncle of course, but then you jumped in front of the king and tried to protect him.”

David pauses. Jack responds with a glare and a raised eyebrow, so David continues, “You lead King Silas’ snipers to me and then jumped in front of the bullet when they tried to assassinate me.”

“I didn’t lead them to you,” Jack says through clenched teeth.

“Do you actually believe that?” David asks, no malice or accusation, just simple curiosity. It causes Jack to pause rather than jumping instantly on the defense.

“I…” Jack closes his eyes in frustration. “I don’t know. Oh God, I led them here, didn’t I?”

David nods.

“Fuck,” Jack mutters as Montgomery tapes the bandage, almost finished. “But I’m trained in covert ops, they couldn’t have followed me for two months. But I’ve been off. Of course.” Jack’s gaze falls to the floor, he’s talking aloud but to himself. “I’m a fucking fool. I couldn’t have made it out of Gilboa unless Silas fucking wanted me to. And Andrew, why would he visit just to tell me…and with a gun? God, I’m a fucking idiot, my father let me go…”

Jack’s consumed by his thoughts, so it startles him when David bends down next to him, filling the void after Montgomery walks away. It is just the two of them now, and David touches Jack’s arm gently just below the fresh bullet wound. The heat of his hand anchors Jack, calms him, and Jack looks up into David’s too-blue eyes. His breathing hitches. It is the first time today that David has looked at him with true affection.

“I believe you,” David says so low that only Jack can hear him, an intimate secret as if they are the only two people in the world.

“Why?” There is no anger in Jack’s voice, just confusion and awe.

“I know this will just make you mad, and you’ll tell me I’m full of shit.” Jack noticeably jerks at the sound of a curse word coming from the mouth of God’s chosen. David chuckles. “I _do_ swear, Jack. I was in the military, remember?”

“There is no evidence that you swore before meeting me, so I’ll chalk it up to my bad influence.” Jack smiles.

“Sure.” David is smiling too and it makes Jack feel warm inside. “But what I was saying is that I know you, Jack. I know you think I don’t and you like to be…misunderstood. And sometimes you confuse the hell out of me and you always will. But I know you didn’t know about the snipers. My men don’t believe that, since they thought you were out to kill me even before a sniper shot me. They thought I was crazy to even talk to you, but I told them what I’m going to tell you now.”

“I can hardly wait.”

“God told me that you were coming to help me, but with a cloud of darkness.”

“I am the cloud of darkness,” Jack mutters.

“Shut up,” David answers, and Jack realizes that no one outside of his family has ever told him to shut up, but it doesn’t even bother him when David does. “The men were convinced you were here to kill me, sent by Silas, so we watched you to see if you met with anyone. It was hard watching you be so alone. I _wanted_ to talk to you, Jack, but I promised the men we’d watch you for a week and then I was going in. And we never saw anything. You never met with anyone. No one was tailing you. The men fought me on it, but I was done watching. So I walked into this bar and sat down.”

“But, from the moment you sat down, you acted like I was trying to set a trap for you? You accused me of being a lure.”

They are still speaking low so the other men can’t hear them.

“I didn’t know what else to say. We weren’t exactly friends, Jack, and you don’t respond well to trust in general, so I didn’t think welcoming you with open arms was the best choice. Also, I kind of wanted to beat you to the pass if we were going to accuse each other of betrayal…you know after I helped Silas regain his throne. And to be honest, I still suspected that men might tailing you, that that was the ‘dark cloud’ God was talking about.”

“You’re a dick,” Jack says with a laugh, “and stupid. Why the hell would you follow me outside if you thought Silas’ men might be tailing me?”

“Well, I didn’t know, did I? And I like to know what I’m dealing with, confront a situation head on. If they were following you, I figured I’d present myself and force their hand. I’m not keen to smuggle you back into Gath with Silas’ men on our tail.”

“But they could have shot you in the head.” Jack’s voice raises, too angry and frustrated to care if the other men hear. “A good sniper aims for the head. What the fuck were you thinking, David?”

Jack stands, shrugging David’s hand from his arm and David follows.

“It didn’t seem likely.”

“But possible.”

“Well, sure, _possible_ but unlikely. I didn’t know if there were snipers, but I figured that even if I did get shot your father would want to show my body to his citizens. And head shots are messy.”

“You couldn’t have known that for sure, so don’t say it like that, like you knew it.”

“I trust God,” David replies, growing serious. “He told me you came to help. He told me I just had to trust you.”

Jack throws up his hands and begins to pace, “And what if there is no God?”

David jerks back as if punched and whispers, “Jack, how—“

“Captain Shepherd,” one of the men says tentatively. “I’m sorry to interrupt but we have a report on the snipers.”

David waits a beat, staring at Jack with a hurt look in his eyes. Jack breaks eye contact first, rubbing his face with his hands. The adrenaline has completely dissipated and the hangover is setting in.

“Report,” David says.

“One sniper was killed while trying to escape. He was too far ahead to apprehend and we didn’t want him to get away. The other sniper is in our custody at charlie base.”

“Good. Thank you.”

Jack’s still staring at the floor, but he hears the soldier move away. He knows that David is staring at him, but he doesn’t look up.

Finally David sighs, “I need to ask this sniper a few questions, Jack. My men will bring you back to alpha base. We leave for Gath in an hour.”

“Interrogation was one of my specialties,” Jack mutters, still studying the ground. “I can help.”

David moves toward him and grasps his forearm warmly. It is odd, actually, how often David has chosen to touch Jack today. It was always the other way around in Shiloh, with Jack putting his arm around David, hugging him, grasping his arm. David had never reciprocated. It hadn’t seemed odd at the time, Jack was the crown prince so people kept their distance, but now Jack wonders what prompted the change in David. Not that he’s complaining.

“I’m simply going to talk to him,” David says. “Not an interrogation, but I appreciate the offer.”

“He won’t answer your questions. You’ll need to hurt him and hurting people is one of my specialties, not yours.” It comes out bitter and David’s eyes grow sad as he squeezes Jack’s arm slightly.

“I don’t actually need him to talk, Jack. I just need him to listen and bring a message back to Silas.”

“You’re not going to kill him?”

“Don’t worry, I’m not as stupid as you think I am. He’ll be drugged and anonymously dropped on you father’s doorstep. We’ll be deep inside Gath at that point.”

“And what’s the message?” Jack asks.

“That you’re safe and with me. And anyone who Silas sends to retrieve you will end up dead.”

Jack stops breathing. Not exactly the message he was imagining.

“Go with the men, Jack. You could use a shower, and _now_ we leave in less than an hour.”


	3. I can't believe it's true

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from "Talk" by Coldplay.

Showers have long been Jack’s place to think…or to have sex. He’s had quite a lot of sex in showers. But when he’s not having sex in the shower, he’s probably using it as an opportunity to think. Having not showered in five days (and having no attractive man in this shower with him), he takes his time, contemplating everything that’s happened and what it means for Michelle.

He should have guessed that Silas orchestrated his “escape” but he didn’t, and he can’t dwell on that idiocy. Given that Silas did let him go so that he could draw David into the open, it makes the entire conversation with Andrew moot, maybe. Based on her absence from all Gilboan news outlets and palace functions, Michelle is certainly in exile. But the certainty ends there.

Is she really pregnant?

Is she really missing?

After standing in the streaming water for 20 minutes, one of David’s men knocks angrily on the shower door and yells something about how the _princess_ is using all of the hot water. He hops out the shower and quickly prepares for the journey ahead.

He’s completely ruined the field dressing, but it will be fun to annoy the man who made it. _Montgomery, I need you to dress my wound again. I got it all wet._ The bastard has it coming after being a snarky bitch, even though the field dressing was admittedly good. David has assembled a very competent crew of soldiers who appear to be loyal to him above anything else. If Silas knew…or maybe he does know and that was why he was willing to release Jack for the chance to kill David.

But another thought keeps weighing on Jack’s mind no matter how many times he tries to turn his thoughts away from it.

How in the hell he is going to tell David about Michelle?

The longer he waits to tell him, the more awkward it will be. But they are never alone during the journey to Zafit, a large city in the interior mountains of Gath. Then Jack is a bit distracted by the semi-automatic weapon that is pressed to the back of his skull while a Gath general tells him to get on his knees and make peace with his Lord. He only hears snippets of David’s pleas through his panic, _He’s not Silas…loyal to me…wants peace with Gath._ He knows it is futile, he is a Benjamin and King Silas has not only gone back on his word, he has reinitiated war with Gath.

But David is the luckiest son of a bitch ever, because he not only talks the General out of shooting Jack, he also convinces him that Jack must stay with David and his men for his own protection, rather than a prison cell.

Jack regards David with a mixture of loathing and awe as he sits by the window of the two-bedroom apartment in one of Gath’s government estates, nestled amongst the granite peaks and evergreen forests. Why does everything work out for him and nothing ever works out for Jack? He considers delaying the conversation about Michelle, just for spite and because he is beyond tired, but it will only be more awkward if he waits.

He isn’t even sure why he is avoiding it, except that when David finishes brushing his teeth he smiles at Jack and the whole room lights up. David hasn’t even asked about Michelle yet, but her ring is on David’s left hand, as if they are married. The thought nauseates Jack.

“So Premier Shaw just lets you have your own soldiers? Puts you all up in a house out of the goodness in his heart?” Jack asks, rubbing his beard, taking pleasure in the fact that he will finally get to shave it tonight.

“Oh no, he wants a great deal from me, Jack. The peaceful incorporation of my homeland into his nation being one of them.”

“And when he doesn’t need you for that anymore?”

“Don’t worry. By then, he’ll need other things from me, a great deal of things.”

David is being purposefully obtuse, but he might also be much more intelligent than Jack gave him credit for. He’s certainly learning how to play the political game. You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours.

“I know that God told you I came to help,” Jack mutters, playing with the frayed fabric on the arm of his chair.

“Are you back to believing in God?” David asks, without malice, but the question still rubs Jack the wrong way and he almost shelves this conversation for the distant future. Why should Jack believe in God when God doesn’t believe in him?

“He’s never spoken to me,” Jack says. “That makes it a little harder to believe.”

“I understand.”

“How does he speak to you anyway? Does he come down all bearded and sit in a chair and have a conversation over tea?” Jack knows he’s stalling. He needs to tell David about Michelle and the baby, but it is addictive being the center of David’s focus and he isn’t ready to give that up.

David chuckles. “No, it is symbols, you just have to know how to see them. Maybe he has spoken to you before and you just didn’t realize.”

“He hasn’t,” Jack says without hesitation. He isn’t certain of much in his life, but he’s certain of that. “How did he tell you I was coming, the ever-present butterfly?”

David grins again and sits in the chair opposite Jack. “No, butterflies are about monarchies. When he speaks to me about you, it’s with blood.”

“Blood? How fitting. The symbol God chooses for me is blood.”

“Not like that. Blood isn’t bad. It’s life and warmth. People make blood-oaths to demonstrate their loyalty and commitment. Blood is powerful and…real.”

“But what happened to make you think I was ‘coming to help but with a dark cloud’?”

“Three weeks ago I was walking in a meadow, thinking about you and…Michelle. I hadn’t heard any news of either of you. I’d caught reports from Shiloh but neither of you were in them. And suddenly a finch fell out of the sky and landed in front of me. It was panicking and I thought its wing was broken, so I picked it up. It was bleeding from three scratches along its body, side by side as if made by the talons of a hawk. Then I heard this screech from above. The hawk must have caught the finch in mid-air and then somehow dropped it. It was circling, and the finch burrowed into my hand, like he knew that I would protect him. The hawk dived, completely fearless and he clipped me on the head. Of course I started to run, the finch still nestled in my palm.

“The hawk kept chasing me until I made it back here and after I got inside and collapsed, the finch hopped out of my hand and just sat on the carpet and looked at me. Dark, black eyes. I touched my head where the hawk had hit me and I was bleeding. I was sitting there, my blood in my left hand and the bird’s blood in my right hand and I just knew. God has spoken to me about your family before and it is always birds, but the blood, well…blood is you.”

“So, I’m a tiny finch?” Jack asks, not even concealing his annoyance, not even noticing that David alluded to receiving other messages about Jack, that Jack is blood. “God thinks I’m a finch. Just fucking great.”

David starts chuckling at Jack’s annoyance.

“Shut it,” Jack cries, rising to his feet. “You know, I don’t think God is talking to you, or Silas for that matter. This is just a case of two people with delusions of grandeur who read too much into random events.”

“Jack,” David says, but he’s still smirking, laughing at Jack.

“I’m going to bed,” Jack hisses and turns away.

“I’m the finch, Jack,” David manages to say, which stops him in his tracks. “God was telling me that you were coming to help me like I helped the finch.”

“Now I know you’re crazy,” Jack says. “Shepherd, weird things happen all of the time to everybody. It doesn’t make it a sign from God.”

“But—“

“No, you rushed out into the street and let snipers shoot you based on your faith in that story? How have you even survived this long?”

“I know that weird things happen,” David replies. “But it feels different when the message is from God. When it’s Him, you just _know,_ because the knowledge…the meaning behind everything fills you. Everything is clear and…I can’t explain, but you just _know_.”

Jack sits back down, takes a deep breath and decides to ignore how idiotic David can be. This conversation had a purpose, one that Jack needs to reclaim.

“David, regardless of why _God_ thinks I came to you, I need to tell you why I came to you.”

“Okay,” David looks so open and happy and unaware. Jack takes a beat to bask in his joy before ruining it.

“I was on house arrest for three months before I escaped, locked in an apartment in the palace with Lucinda.”

“Sounds…rough.” David’s voice is incredulous and abnormally sarcastic. “Being locked in a plush apartment with your fiancée.”

“Silas told us that we would be locked in there until we produced an heir. Then he would steal the child and raise it as his own, since his other two heirs are such huge disappointments.”

David sucks in a sharp breath and leans forward in his chair.

“Does that sound plush? Would you want to be locked in a room with Michelle and told that?”

“Of course not, I’m sorry. Your fiancée should not have had to suffer your punishment with you. You must have been furious.”

Jack almost laughs at David’s adorable naivety and smirks. “Yeah, Shepherd, _that_ was why I hated it. But my point was that I didn’t see anyone, Silas, Mother, or Michelle, so I had no idea what was going on in Gilboa until after I’d escaped.”

“How did you escape?”

“My cousin came in after Lucinda had been removed…for her own safety,” he mutters it, ashamed of how it sounds but unwillingly to explain since his tantrum was about Joseph’s death. “He had a gun stashed in his boot, which I obviously stole after I beat the shit out of him.”

He is grateful to see that there is no judgment in David’s eyes.

“But, the reason I finally decided to escape and find you is because of what Andrew told me.”

“Okay,” David is obviously intrigued and slightly impatient, but he is trying to let Jack get to the point on his own.

“Before I tell you, David, just know that everything is fine with Michelle and I don’t even know if I believe all of this information because after the snipers, I think Silas let me escape. He sent Andrew in and told him to say these things as an incentive for me to find you.”

“Okay,” David is noticeably agitated now.

“Andrew told me that Michelle is in exile.”

“What? Where?”

“That is the thing about exile. Nobody gets to know where she is…except the king. But that isn’t all, David, just let me finish.”

David’s eyes are wide and he is already starting to lose his cool. This is not going to go well.

“Andrew told me that Michelle is…pregnant.”

The silence and stillness that follows is painful, but Jack let’s David control the moment. This is his moment.

“But we only…just that one night. And she told me that the illness…” David utters.

“What night?”

“The night the lights went out. Michelle was different that night, carefree, like—“

“Like she could be anyone she wanted to be?”

“Yeah, God, how long ago was that?”

“Seven months,” Jack replies without hesitation.

“She’s gonna give birth in two months, Jack.” David stands and walks jerkily around the room like he knows he has to move, to get to Michelle, but he doesn’t have anywhere to go. “It could be sooner even, a month. I have to find Michelle, now.”

“This is what I was worried about.”

“So you chose to wait to tell me?”

“That wasn’t why I waited. I was waiting until we were alone—“

“It doesn’t matter, I’m just. I can’t think. I don’t know.”

“Sit down.” Jack’s voice is commanding, his _royal_ voice that he learned from his mother for telling servants what to do. Amazingly, David sits without hesitation, but he’s fidgeting and his eyes are wild.

“I’ve been thinking about this and I need you to hear me out. Really listen, okay?”

David nods, but he isn’t looking at Jack, his mind is still elsewhere. It’s the best Jack can hope for so he starts talking, his voice slow and calm.

“If Michelle is seven months, that means she was two months pregnant when she was exiled, the same day I was imprisoned and you fled, so she knew about the baby.”

“And she didn’t even tell me.”

“She was just protecting you from doing something stupid. Stay with me. My point is that my mother probably knew about the baby, too. Otherwise, Michelle’s exile makes no sense.”

“What do you mean?”

“Michelle didn’t turn on Silas, she remained a loyal. But I managed to find out that the official reason behind her exile was aiding meduring the coup, which we know isn’t true. Her real crimes are loving you and carrying your child inside of her.”

“But, Jack, you can’t think that your father would hurt his own daughter, his only grandchild, just because he hates me.”

“I can and I do,” Jack replies which instantly causes David to deflate. He thinks it too. It isn’t a certainty, but it’s possible and that’s enough.

“David, what happened the night you fled Shiloh? I searched for information after I escaped, but I couldn’t find anything.”

There is a painful silence in which David simply gazes into his hands. Jack is sure that he didn’t even hear him speak, too wrapped up in thoughts of Michelle and the baby…understandably. Jack can’t fault him for worrying about the woman he loves, even if it hurts to have slipped from David’s focus.

“Your father attacked me with a poker and I beat him up.”

“What?”

“I never told anyone this, Jack, but my second day at the palace, you know after my big party, I went out to get one more look at the ocean from the palace grounds. I was due to go back home that day and I knew I’d never get to see that view again.”

Classic David Shepherd, taking joy in the little things, appreciating a view that Jack hadn’t even noticed in years.

“And suddenly there were all of these butterflies, monarch butterflies, flapping around me and then they landed on my head one by one and made a crown…of butterflies.”

“What the fuck,” Jack mutters. He’s lost the ability to move or think or even breathe.

“I didn’t think anybody knew about it, except me, but I guess your father saw.”

“I thought.” Jack can barely speak, tears are forming in his eyes and he is starting to hyperventilate. “I thought the butterfly story was bullshit.”

“You mean you didn’t believe that it happened to your father?”

“No, never. I—what the fuck?”

“Do you not believe me? What I just told you?”

“No. I believe you. I completely fucking believe you which means my father wasn’t lying about it either. But it never happened to me. I was _never_ destined to be king and he _knew_ it.”

“I’m sorry,” David whispers.

“Then, Silas was trying to kill you all along. If he saw that crown of butterflies, he’s hated you all along.”

“Yeah,” David sighs. “And that was why he hit me with a poker, after accusing me and God of cheating on him, of laughing at him. He was crazy. I don’t like the say that about the king, but he was crazy.”

“But you got the upper hand.”

“I guess hitting someone with a poker isn’t as satisfying at hitting him with your fists, because he wound up on top of me punching me. And before I knew it, I was on top of him, yelling and punching him. Just over and over again. I’ve never been that angry. I didn’t even know what I was doing. And then all of a sudden, he just looked so old and broken, like a man, not like a king. And I ran.”

Without warning, Jack’s tears give way to laughter. David glares up and him and Jack tries to stop laughing, but he can’t. It starts low in his belly, building until he is keeled over in his chair, laughing.

“It’s not funny, hitting an old man, Jack,” David says, but the smile is creeping into his face too.

“True, but hitting Silas Benjamin makes you my fucking hero.”

“No.” But Jack’s joy is infectious and David’s smile grows. “He’s your father and the king and—“

“The biggest asshole that ever walked the planet. And a pompous windbag. And a jealous hypocrite. And a _fucking bigot_.” The last one comes out low and angry and Jack’s joy fades instantly.

David notices and stops smiling too. “So you think your mother sent Michelle into exile to protect her from your father?”

“Completely,” Jack says, solemn and staring at the floor. “My mother loves her children even more than she loves the power or Silas. Well, not me anymore, but I’m sure she still loves Michelle and the baby.”

“But if Silas knows about the baby, then Michelle isn’t safe.”

“Except that Andrew told me one more thing,” Jack sighs, remembering the last bit of information, “It could be good…or bad.”

“Just tell me, please, Jack?”

“Andrew told me that Michelle had gone missing.”

David’s face pales and tears well instantly. “How could that be good?”

“Maybe Silas only thinks she’s missing. Maybe it was my mother. Michelle could be somewhere safe.”

“Or she could not,” David responds, bottom lip starting to quiver. He looks wrecked, no longer the smiling beauty that he was ten minutes before.

“She could be okay.”

“That isn’t good enough.”

“I know.”

“Why?” David is shaking and his voice is so quiet Jack has to lean forward to hear. “Why can’t your family be like a normal family? You know, if one of my brothers were maybe missing, I could just call my mother and ask, and she’d tell me.”

It’s rhetorical, obviously, but it’s also fucking brilliant. The corner of Jack’s mouth tilts up as the pieces fall into place inside his brain.

“That’s actually a great idea,” Jack says. “I’ll just call Mother and ask.”

* * *

Every part of David’s body is fidgeting and it’s driving Jack insane.

“Will you calm down? I can’t do this with you buzzing around me like a bee,” Jack says, going through the script once more in his head. “Okay, shh. Seriously.”

He dials his mother’s cell phone number into the untraceable phone that David procured. He’d written down his family’s schedule, picking the best time of day to catch his mother alone. David had been a ball of nervous energy all day, but it’s now or never. Tomorrow David’s men will drop the sniper’s unconscious body on the steps of the palace, and then this conversation will get a thousand times harder.

Jack rubs his chin where his beard used to be. He misses it, oddly.

The phone rings five times and then goes to voicemail.

Deep breath.

“Mother, I’m calling back in 30 seconds. Pick up when I do.”

He hangs up and looks at David, counting the seconds. An eternity passes until David nods and Jack dials again.

Four rings and he’s about to give up when, “Jack?”

David breathes in sharply. Jack flares his eyes, a silent warning. He doesn’t have Rose Benjamin on speaker, because she would hear the distinctive hollow sound of it, but he’s turned up the volume so David can hear.

“Mother.” his voice comes out exactly as he’d planned, sweet but not weak, hopeful but not desperate.

“Jack, tell me where you are.”

“So you can pass the information on to Silas?”

She sighs. “No. Fine. Are you at least safe?”

She might be trying to trace the call, but he doesn’t worry since David assured him that it isn’t possible. Still, best to move the conversation along, get to the point before he loses the element of surprise.

“You know what Andrew told me the night I escaped, right?”

She pauses so long, Jack starts to worry. “About what?”

“Mother, please. You know. About Michelle.”

“Yes.”

“So you know what I’m planning to do?” she doesn’t reply, so Jack continues, “I will find Shepherd. He deserves to know about Michelle.”

“Don’t. If you align yourself with David Shepherd, all that waits for you is death. Please don’t.”

“But Michelle is missing. I have to find her. You should _want_ me to find her. Unless she isn’t missing.”

“Jack.” She sighs.

“If she is missing, out there pregnant and alone, I have to help her.”

“You expect me to believe that?” She is doubtful but he can tell that he hasn’t lost her trust…yet. “You are worried about your sister? You are going to put your sister’s well-being in front of your own?”

“I love Michelle, you know that.”

“Did you love her when you ordered that guard to shoot her?”

_Shit. Shit. Shit._

David’s eyes are burning with fury and completely focused on Jack, so intense he has to turn away.

“I wasn’t going to, you know that.” He lets his voice break down slightly. “She didn’t believe in me and neither did you. Ever. Just like Father.”

“Still blaming everyone else for your bad choices?”

He pauses, makes it seem like he’s thinking about her words. “No. I’m not. That’s why I want to do right by Michelle. I can find her, Mother, and I can help her and the baby without Father ever finding out. She could be in danger. Aren’t you worried?”

His mother pauses for so long Jack pulls back to look at the phone, thinking he’s disconnected, but he hasn’t.

“She’s not in danger. Your father doesn’t know where she is,” Rose finally says. In other words, Silas found out about the baby, so Rose moved Michelle. His mother’s cunning never ceases to amaze him. But she’s playing a dangerous game of chess with a man who will stop at nothing to get what he wants.

“I still need to find her, she shouldn’t be alone with this.”

“Jack, she lost the baby.”

David’s entire body crumbles and he falls onto the chair behind him.

“Then why is she still in exile?”

“You don’t understand anything, what I wouldn’t do to protect both you and your sister against anything and anyone…even your father. Was your prison truly worse than death? Worse than the dozen other options your father came up with before I convinced him to go with that one? Then you had to go and fall for his idiotic trick, the lies he fed to you through Andrew,” Rose replies. “Don’t go after David Shepherd or your sister. You’ll just get them killed. Promise me, Jack, promise me you won’t.”

“I’m sorry, I can’t. I have to go.”

“Jack.”

“I miss you,” he says, surprised that it’s true. Despite everything she’s done to him and the fact that he’s still uncertain about her potential involvement in Joseph’s death. But he had always been her favorite child and she had been his favorite parent.

“Jack, please—“

He hangs up.

David’s head is in his hands and he’s shaking, presumably crying, for a lost baby who might not even be lost. Jack wishes he could go to him, wrap his arms around him and bring him comfort. But they don’t have that kind of relationship. Generally, they aren’t even friends.

“I don’t think she lost the baby,” Jack murmurs.

“Don’t say stuff like that. I can’t let myself think that if it’s not true.” He’s still collapsed in on himself.

“I’m saying it because Michelle is still in exile and she wouldn’t be if she’d lost the baby. I think my mother’s still trying to protect the baby.” Jack kneels down but keeps his distance, dropping his voice to a whisper. “I don’t know it for sure. But you don’t know either.”

They remain like two statues, David hunched and silently crying into his hands as Jack kneels on the floor. Together in despair, but separated by a distrust that still lingers between them and a history that still can’t be forgotten.

Finally, David sighs and rises. He holds out his hand. “I need to return the phone.”

Jack stands as well and drops the phone into his hand.

“I can’t even think right now. Or feel. Or anything. There’s just this pit in my soul," David mutters.

“I know."

“But when I can think again, you and I are going to have a conversation about what your mother said on the phone.”

“What part?” Jack stupidly responds.

David leans toward him, red-rimmed eyes darker and deadlier than Jack ever thought them capable of. “You know what part.”

* * *

It isn’t so much a conversation as a one-sided (and rather pathetic) explanation of Jack’s situation during the coup. David had left, Silas was still alive, and William Cross was being a backstabbing asshole. Everything was slipping through Jack’s fingers. All he’d ever wanted was to be a good king to Gilboa and nobody was fucking cooperating with him at all.

And then, his own sister had stood up and undermined him. He tries to explain that he simply asked the guard to point a gun at Michelle so she would sit down and he could regain control of the situation.

Of course, this just earns him a very hard punch to the face from David.

“Whenever I start believing in you, you always demonstrate that I shouldn’t.”

“Me?” Jack cries, knowing he can’t win this, but too pissed off to care. “You went behind my back to find my asshole father and give him back a throne he doesn’t deserve. You fucking left me there.”

“I wasn’t part of your stupid coup, Jack. I had every right to leave, because you weren’t my king.”

Then the punching really starts. It’s rather juvenile, Jack knows, and they are evenly matched so he isn’t going to simply win this one. He gets a few good hits in before David pushes him away and tells him to stop.

They are both breathing hard, more from anger than the brawl, so Jack willingly takes a beat.

“I’ll admit,” David’s voice is clipped and still filled with anger, “my loyalty to Silas was misplaced. He was my king. I’d always been a loyal servant and so, knowing that he was still alive, I did my duty as a citizen. But I realize now, that I was mistaken about him.”

“You’re admitting you should have stuck by my side?” Jack can’t help the way his voice cracks with pathetic hope.

“No. William Cross is a horrible person and he was going to drop our country back into war. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what Silas did anyway. But that doesn’t change the fact that Silas was still alive, so you were not king.”

“And if he’d been dead?”

David pauses. “You were not my king, Jack. I’m sorry.”

Jack balls his fists and takes a deep breath. He wishes they’d kept punching each other because it was better than this hollow, dead feeling.

No one has ever believed in him, not really. Maybe Joseph did, but he also existed in the periphery of Jack’s life, never beside him in a battle or a diplomatic function. He'd known Jack’s soul in a way that no one else ever had, but he hadn’t known Jack as a soldier or a king…like David did.

His father, mother, sister, uncle, himself, even God, hadn’t believed that he could be a good king. But somehow, it has never hurt more than it does coming from David Shepherd, because he would make a great king.


	4. I stayed in the darkness with you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from Florence + the Machine's "Cosmic Love."

Spring teeters and falls completely into summer. David has nearly twenty men, soldiers from the undisputed territory, serving and protecting him. Two of David’s brothers, Sean and Abe, are on his team, and they aren’t exactly fond of Jack. He steers clear of them and David’s other men, most of the time. Nobody trusts him except David, who is growing more agitated as Michelle’s (possible) due date draws near.

Jack is lying in the grass, gazing at the trees as they sway underneath the sunlight, simply enjoying his freedom when David’s face comes into view.

“I was hoping you could train some of the men tomorrow,” David states.

“In what? Leading failed coups?”

David rolls his eyes. “Sure, but also interrogation techniques and I read once that you excelled at long-range weapons training at the academy.”

“The sniper training I can do,” Jack mutters closing his eyes with a contented sigh. “But I don’t think your men would appreciate my interrogation techniques. They already think I’m an asshole.”

“Well, your behavior certainly doesn’t help that perception.”

“Excuse me?” Jack says, sitting up and turning to face David who is still standing over him.

“You act like you’re above them, like you’re a prince.”

“I am a prince.”

“I saw how you treated your men on that mission to Gath. You treated them like fellow soldiers, not subjects, so I know that you are fully capable of treating my men with respect.”

“Can you just go away? I was busy.”

“No you weren’t,” David replies, sitting next to him. “That’s the problem, you’re bored and that’s making you cranky, so can you please just help out and train the men?”

“Interrogation isn’t for the faint of heart, so if you have any men who aren’t whiny pussies, send them my way.”

David sighs and pulls a dandelion from the ground, twirling it between his fingers before blowing the seeds into the breeze. Jack’s heart clenches at the memory of Thomas, the first boy he ever kissed. Thomas loved to do that and Jack loved to watch the curve of his lips as he did.

David notices the odd look on Jack’s face when he gazes up; he furrows his brow. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Jack murmurs.

“I could be a father right now,” David says out of nowhere, but he does that a lot lately since it’s obviously the only thing on his mind. “She passed the eight month mark three days ago.”

“I know.”

“I feel like I’m going crazy, stuck here with no way to figure out what’s going on with Michelle.”

“I know.”

David starts ripping at the grass, his frustration obvious. It seems as good a time as any for Jack to ask the question that has been plaguing him for months. It might, at the very least, temporarily distract David from his obsessive preoccupation with Michelle.

“David?”

“Mmm?” He doesn’t look up.

“How did you know where Silas was after he got shot?”

David is still ripping up the grass. His body is present but his brain is elsewhere. When he answers, he seems lost in thought, like he doesn’t realize he’s even talking and therefore doesn’t check his words.

“He was with Helen.”

“Helen who?”

“You know, _Helen_ ,” David says, still distracted, “and Seth.”

“Who the hell are Helen and Seth?” Jack asks, his anxiety escalating.

David breathes in abruptly and his eyes widens. He snaps completely out of his trance and looks at Jack. He’s certainly present in the moment now.

“Uh…”

He is mentally backpedalling, desperately trying to find a way to take back his words and escape this conversation. Jack grabs him a bit roughly by the arm, “Who are Helen and Seth?”

David stares, mouth open and eyes wide, trapped. It’s difficult, but Jack waits, because he can see that David’s resolve is deteriorating in the face of no escape. Finally, he sighs and gazes down at the tufts of grass in his hands.

“Your father’s mistress,” he whispers, “and her son.”

Jack’s body freezes except for his hand, which clenches on David’s arm like it’s a lifeline, keeping him from spinning out of control.

“ _Her_ son or _his_ son?”

David looks up at him. “Your father’s son with Helen.”

Jack’s mind is a jumbled mess of questions and memories. His father’s constant “pilgrimages.” Thomasina always went on those with Silas; did she know about his other family? Did Jack’s mother know? Did she simply not care? How old is this bastard son…who Jack never fucking knew about? How does David know about him?

That question stops him cold and he tightens his grip on David’s arm, causing him to hiss in pain. But he doesn’t push Jack away.

“Why the fuck do you know about a mistress and a bastard son, and I didn’t?”

“Jack.” David’s voice is calm and it unleashes a fury in Jack who pulls David toward him, wishing he could rip David’s arm out of its socket. David finally tries to get away, placing his hand on Jack’s chest and pushing him.

Jack just tightens his grip, rising to his feet and dragging David with him. He gets in David’s face. “Why did you fucking know?”

“He brought me out there. Your father brought me out there. I don’t know why.”

“You met them? Where the fuck do they live?”

“In a house out in the countryside.”

“This bastard, Seth, how old is he?”

“I don’t know, eight, maybe? But he’s sick, like Michelle was.”

Jack lets David go, who rubs his arm where there is sure to be a bruise tomorrow.

“So the kid is going to die?”

“I don’t know, Michelle didn’t.”

“I hope the little bastard dies.”

“How can you say that? He’s just a kid, a sweet kid.”

“Shut up!”

David looks up to the house suddenly, causing Jack to turn too. David’s brother, Sean, is walking quickly across the lawn toward them. _Great._

“David, is everything okay?”

_Just fucking great._

Sean must have seen Jack manhandling his precious baby brother and he just had to bound out and save him from the evil Benjamin. Jack walks a few steps away, worried that if he stays he might punch both of them.

“It’s fine. Can you just give us a moment?” David pleads.

“It looked like you two were about to come to blows.”

“We weren’t. Jack was just upset about something, but not at me.”

“It was _a little_ at you,” Jack mutters, turning back to glare. Sean actually positions himself in front of David, like his younger brother isn’t a grown man who can take care of himself.

_I have a younger brother too,_ Jack realizes suddenly, thinking of this faceless sickly eight-year-old as his brother for the first time, and not just Silas’ bastard son. His face contorts with enough rage that Sean misinterprets it and steps toward him, ready to defend David.

“Stop it,” David cries, his voice firm as he drags Sean back. “I’m not a child anymore, Sean. I can handle Jack Benjamin.” He looks at Jack, a faint smile on his lips. “Even when he is a little mad at me.”

“I just saw…” Sean begins.

“It was about something private, regarding Jack’s family. Can you please just give us a minute? We need a minute.”

Sean looks between them, torn. “I know you trust him, but—“

Jack turns away in disgust as David interrupts his brother. “I do trust him. You don’t have to. But can you trust me, at least, please. We were in the middle of something.”

Jack hears Sean mutter something to David that might include the word _asshole_ and then the crunching of his boots on the grass as he walks back to the house.

“Seth doesn’t even realize that Silas is the king, he just knows him as his dad.”

“Really? Is he a fucking idiot?”

“He’s a child, Jack, and he isn’t a threat to you or your desire to take the throne, if that’s what this is about.”

Jack rounds on David and advances toward him so quickly that David stumbles. He isn’t fast enough and soon Jack has him by his collar, pulling him forward.

“You think that’s why I’m upset? Because some sickly bastard baby is going to take the throne from me? I’m _never_ going to sit on the throne of Gilboa, David, but it won’t be because of this bastard…or even Michelle. No, it will be because of you. God wants you on the throne.”

“I’m sorry, but it isn’t my fault.” David looks so innocent and lost, it oddly calms Jack enough that he’s laughing at the absurdity of it.

“Amazingly, your inevitable ascension to the throne isn’t high on my anger list today.” He lets go of David and takes a deep breath, trying to get his emotions in check. He only half succeeds. “My father has a whole other family that I didn’t even know about.”

“Yeah.” David frowns, finally starting to understand.

“I have a fucking half-brother, who’s ‘sweet.’”

“He is.” David looks like he might cry, even though Jack feels too broken for tears.

“We give up what we want when we want power,” Jack whispers to himself.

“What?” David leans forward.

“That’s what Silas said to me, ‘We give up what we want when we want power.’ Except I guess he didn’t.”

“Why would he say that to you?”

Jack should just walk back up to the house without dignifying David with an answer. He doesn’t deserve the answer. But for some reason, Jack can’t ever resist being truthful with him, giving him honesty when he’d tell anyone else a lie. So, he answers, but he’s careful to keep the pronouns vague. David doesn’t need to know _everything._

“There was someone I loved,” Jack says, looking past David toward the trees in the distance, but he can still see the look of shock on David’s face at his admission…or he’s probably shocked that Jack is capable of love. “Someone my father didn’t approve of. So he said that to me, when he told me I had to give up this person if I ever wanted to be king…and I did. I ended it. And the whole time my father had a woman on the side. And you said he visits her, right? He’s still with her?”

David simply nods.

“I hate him.” It comes out strangled, like a curse. “I hate that fucking man. I hate him so much.”

The tears start then, like a flood and Jack falls to his knees. He doesn’t even care that David is seeing him weak and broken, or Sean, who is probably still watching from the house. He doesn’t care about anything except how much he hates Silas…and himself for letting Joseph down. He should have been stronger. He should have lived the life he wanted to live regardless of his father’s tyrannical rules. And he shouldn’t be surprised to learn that his father didn’t abide by his own rules, even as he forced them on everyone else.

He’s too numb to push David’s arms away when they wrap awkwardly around him. Instead, he leans into him and cries.

“I’m sorry, Jack, I’m sorry,” David says, like a mantra.

And oddly, it helps.

* * *

Jack retires to his bedroom for three days and stays drunk the entire time. David slips him food, but doesn’t pester him. He lets him self-destruct, somehow sensing that Jack needs it.

When Jack emerges three days later, he’s filled with purpose. He’s ready to train David’s soldiers any way he can, interrogation, long-range weapons, covert ops. He jumps into the work, unaffected by their obvious distrust of him. He doesn’t need their trust, he just needs their attention and their respect, which he acquires the first day by shooting an apple from 400 yards.

He knows with absolute certainty why he’s here now. He’s here to help David overthrow Silas. For the first time in his life he wants to dethrone Silas more than he wants the crown for himself. And if that means putting God’s Chosen, David, on the throne, so be it. Jack can’t deny that David will make a great king, but more importantly, he isn’t Silas.

Most days, Jack practices with his sniper rifle long after the men have gone inside, the sunlight slowly fading to orange and pink. He imagines that the apples and soda cans are Silas, hears his gravelly voice calling Jack a _faggot_ in his head, takes a deep breath, breathes out and pulls the trigger.

* * *

Slowly, the men welcome Jack into their fold, except for David’s brothers. They continue to regard Jack with distrust and a tiny side of loathing. He appreciates it, actually. David has always been too trusting, so it’s good to know that the other Shepherd boys are compensating for it. David needs a few people at his back reminding him that the world is full of deceitful assholes.

They slip into the dog days of summer and Jack actually feels happy on occasion, relaxed in a way he never felt in Shiloh. He sometimes felt that way on missions when his unit wasn’t getting shot at. It was the calm of not being on display, not being the prince, just being accepted as one of the guys. He knows that he shouldn’t crave that, what with everyone else craving his life of luxury and parties, but he’s always been happiest here, training with other soldiers and laughing over cheap beers.

It’s late August. He’s been in Gath with David for three months and they are at a local bar after a hard day of training. Jack and David had designed an arduous capture-the-flag course and all of the men are exhausted and drinking and laughing together. Even Sean had grudgingly commented that Jack and David made a good team, which made Jack’s heart flutter in a way it shouldn’t. They’re just brothers-in-arms, nothing more. He can’t let his imagination run away with ideas that they might make a good team in other ways.

David is smiling at him over a beer now, slightly drunk and Jack is preparing for an emotional speech on fatherhood and princesses in exile. They are approaching the ten-month mark on Michelle’s pregnancy. If Rose was lying about Michelle losing the baby, then David is certainly a father now.

On the nine-month mark, Jack dragged David out to a bar and proceeded to get him wasted. No one else, not even David’s brothers, know about Michelle and the possible baby. So, Jack is the only one David can turn to when he feels lost and angry, and Jack does his best not to hate every minute of it. But he does hate it.

David loves Michelle. The ring on his finger is a constant reminder, but these months training with David have only caused Jack to slip deeper into his ridiculous attraction toward him. He isn’t simply the dim-witted cocker spaniel Jack initially pegged him to be. He’s bright and thoughtful, perceptive and caring. But he is also occasionally dark and selfish. He has his moments of anger, moments when he is the one trying to drown his sorrows in alcohol and Jack is the one getting dragged along for the ride.

But today is a good day and David is a good drunk. Jack smiles back when David raises his glass and says, “To the future of Gilboa.”

One of the other men raises his glass and replies, “To the future  _king_  of Gilboa.”

David’s face falls and he looks to Jack, slightly afraid, but Jack is buzzing on three beers and too happy to let something as trivial as the loss of his birthright get to him, so he raises his own glass and drinks.

Afterward, David drags him back to the house, but not inside, he pulls him toward the big lawn and onto the grass. Jack’s heart starts to pound a little too quickly as David lies down beside him, close but not touching, and gazes up at the stars.

“Thank you for today,” David says, only slightly slurred with drink. “That ops course was mostly you and it was great.”

“No worries,” Jack replies, ashamed that his voice actually cracks. He’s a ball of nerves being this close to David, lying on the grass on a warm summer night. It’s something he’d do with a date if he wanted to make a move. It’s so damn intimate and romantic that Jack can’t concentrate on anything except the heat rolling off of David’s body and the way his arm is almost touching Jack’s shoulder.

“Why are you doing this?”

“Doing what?” Jack asks terrified, thinking he might have accidently slid his arm or his leg against David.

“Helping me, helping these men, when you know full well that they want me to be king someday.”

“God wants it too.”

“That wasn’t the question.” Despite the darkness, David turns his head and gazes into Jack’s eyes. He’s instantly trapped by the intensity in them. David is so close that Jack could lean forward just a few inches and their lips would be touching.

“I asked you why you’re helping me when you want to be king?” David says.

“I don’t want to be king.” It slips out immediately without any thought.

David actually laughs and looks back up at the stars. “You’ve wanted it your entire life. Why would you stop?”

Jack sighs and turns to look at the stars too. He can think better when he isn’t gazing at David’s lips. He’s also just drunk enough to be dangerously honest, but so is David.

“My entire life I’ve been told that I would be king someday. When you’re told something like that, groomed for it, it becomes what you want whether you want it or not. Not like a pure desire, something that comes from inside of you, but like…an expectation, something you can’t escape, so you just accept it.”

“I get that.”

“And I gave up so much for it.” Jack wishes he could stop talking but it feels so good to be honest and heard, to simply say how he feels and not be told to feel something else. “I gave up my love and myself. And if I sacrificed all of that and didn’t become king, then all of that sacrifice was for nothing.”

“But you could get those things back,” David whispers placing his hand lightly on Jack’s forearm. “You can always get yourself back, and if this woman loved you, you can maybe get her back, too.”

Of course, David is talking about Joseph and just doesn’t know it.

“Dead,” Jack murmurs, not sure why he can’t bring himself to say _He’s dead._ He’s not ashamed of liking boys, not completely, but he’s slightly addicted to the way David looks at him, like he’s a true friend, like he’s someone David trusts. And what would he think of Jack if he knew? Would he look at him with disgust like Rose and Silas did? Would he slap him and call him a faggot too?

“She’s dead?” David gasps, turning his head to look at Jack, concern painting his features. He simply nods and David moves his hand to Jack’s and laces their fingers together.

He doesn’t say _Sorry_ or _When_ or _How._ He doesn’t say anything, just squeezes Jack’s hand and looks back up at the night sky. Jack’s grateful.

Minutes later, still holding David’s hand, Jack asks, because he’s genuinely curious and still a little drunk, “Do you want to be king?”

David laughs quietly. “No, but I get the impression it isn’t up to me.”

“You’ll be a great king.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because you don’t want to be king.”

David just laughs again.

“Because you’ll do what’s right for the people, the country and not what’s right for your ego,” Jack continues.

“I hope so.”

Jack rubs his thumb against David’s hand, still clasped in his. “And what will you do when you’re king, David?”

“I won’t send men off to die when they don’t have to,” David replies, pausing to really consider the question. “I won’t tell the press what they can and can’t say about me…I won’t tell people the butterfly story as if they must accept me as their king just because God wills it…I’ll ask them if they want me to be their king…I’ll ask them what they want and when I can give it to them, I will.”

It’s so beautifully humble and perfect, just like David. For the first time, Jack wants to help him not simply to dethrone Silas, but because he actually believes in him. He knows it’s naïve and probably impossible, but when David speaks of a monarchy for the people, or a Gilboa that is free from tyranny, Jack wants to believe in it. He hopes that it can come true one day and he wants to see it with his own eyes.

It’s such a foreign feeling, _hope._ He wants to hold it close to his heart and nurture it and never let it go.


	5. Nobody said it was easy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Title from "The Scientist" by Coldplay.

On the first crisp day of September, the Gilboan tanks roll into New Hope, a town in the disputed territory.

They fire a few warning shots and then an ultimatum. Gath must give up David Shepherd within five days time or Gilboa will attack. Nobody in the Gath military even seems aware that Silas was building tanks, but there are ten sitting at their doorstep, sure to cause destruction.

Jack, David, his brother, Sean, and one of his men, Ezra Mason, are watching it all unfold on the television at their estate in Zafit.

“I can’t let him do this,” David whispers.

“We can’t stop him,” Sean replies. “With tanks on both sides, there will just be death.”

“I have to turn myself over to King Silas,” David says.

“Sir, I disagree,” Ezra proclaims. “You should talk to Premier Shaw. There has to be a way to fix this. Diplomacy, whatever the fuck that means nowadays, there has to be a diplomatic option.”

“He’s right,” Sean states. “I can’t let you hand yourself over to the firing squad.”

After an awkward pause, Jack’s aware that all three pairs of eyes have turned to him because he hasn’t spoken yet. He can’t tear his eyes away from the rows of tanks on the television.

“Jack?” It’s David.

Jack knows his father well enough to know that this isn’t a bluff. He will attack. But Silas also knows David and assumes that he won’t have to, because he’ll turn himself in. He has identified David’s primary weakness: his desire to protect the citizens of Gilboa at all costs.

If only the citizens could see what Jack sees, that their king doesn’t care about them but David does.

“Checkmate,” Jack mumbles.

“Jack?” David repeats, completely confused as Jack finally turns to look at him.

“You’re right, David, you have to turn yourself in.”

Sean jumps to his feet, of course. Sean fucking Shepherd.

“You’ve been waiting for this, haven’t you, Benjamin? You’ve been waiting for the opportunity to get rid of my brother.”

Jack cocks his head and smirks, which only increases Sean’s ire.

“I don’t need your trust for what I’m planning, Sean, I only need David’s.” Jack turns to him. “Do I have it?”

“What are you thinking?” he replies, raising his hand at his brother to silence him when he starts to protest.

“Everything is a game of chess to my father. He thinks he’s cornered you, so he’ll believe it’s real when you give yourself up, because it will be real.”

“And then what?” Sean asks, voice dripping with anger.

“Covert ops were my specialty. I’ve been training the men in them for months, along with long-range and close-quarters combat. We’ve been training because there might come a day when we have to go to battle, but it was always some abstract notion. Someday we’ll have to fight. Well, that day is now.”

“I won’t let anyone die for me, Jack. If you are suggesting attacking the convoy and killing soldiers, then the answer is ‘No.’ I won’t be responsible for the deaths of civilians or soldiers.”

“David, soldiers die—“

“Like my father, my brother? No.”

Jack doesn’t mention all of the people who have already died for David, the sniper who was killed by David’s men, David’s promise to Silas to kill anyone who came to retrieve Jack. It would probably only solidify his resolve that nobody _else_ will die for him. David seems perfectly willing to kill in order to protect the people he loves, but won’t let Jack kill anyone to protect him? It’s infuriating.

There is no way out of this situation without people dying, but Jack’s worried that David is going to opt for the one scenario in which only one person dies: himself.

He needs to somehow convince David that it isn’t always the number of deaths, but _who_ is dying that matters. David can’t die. That is an absolute certainty, so Jack will have to come up with a plan that involves the least collateral damage and convince David to agree.

Jack opens his mouth to tell him as much, but David must sense the words that are coming because he interrupts.

“Jack, no. I mean it. My life has no more value than anyone else’s and I won’t be responsible for the deaths of innocent civilians or soldiers again. That’s final.”

Jack rolls his eyes and palms his face. This is going to be a problem.

“What if,” Ezra speaks up, his voice quiet but sure, “there was a way to stop the king’s attack and nobody had to die?”

“There isn’t,” Jack replies.

“David could turn himself in to Gath and they could hand him over to Gilboa,” Ezra responds. “And then we could figure out how to attack the convoy in a way in which no soldiers are killed. There has to be a way.”

David nods in approval, but Jack shakes his head.

“I thought of that, but if we free David and leave his transport platoon alive, my father will just kill the soldiers himself and make it look like David did it. It would certainly turn the citizens of Gilboa against us, and that’s what he wants more than anything.”

Ezra’s expression turns dour like he can’t believe the king would kill his own soldiers, but he can’t deny that Jack knows Silas infinitely better than he does.

They are at an impasse, thinking through the possibilities independently and rejecting each in turn. Finally Sean takes a deep breath and his eyes widen in thought. David, Jack and Ezra turn to him expectantly.

“So, what we need is an audience,” Sean says. “Civilians, camera phones. We need an audience for David’s escape, so that everyone knows that nobody died for him and that Gath had nothing to do with it.”

Jack leans forward in his seat, his eyes meeting David’s from across the room as knowing smiles slip onto both of their mouths.

Who’d have thought, David’s annoyingly overprotective brother might have just earned his place at David’s side. Unfortunately for him, the plan that is brewing in Jack’s mind will send Sean and Abe back to their mother in Port Prosperity. Sean, and his distrust of Jack, would ruin the entire plan.

“Silas gave us five days,” Jack says, “We better start tonight, because we are going to need every minute of it.”

* * *

Jack has a lot to get in order, phone calls to make, a half dozen old favors to call in. He’s finally ready the day before Silas’ deadline. He is checking weapons and ammunition when David arrives, hovering in the doorway. They are camped out in a friend’s house near Calvary. Tomorrow General Malick of Gath will turn David Shepherd over in New Hope, where the tanks are stationed.

“There are still too many variables. It could still go completely wrong.”

“That’s what makes it fun,” Jack replies, not looking up from his task. “Is everyone else in place?”

“Yes. Mom’s about to leave with Sean and Abe,” David’s brothers are heading back to their farm. To protect his mother from suspicion and retaliation, David asked his brothers to stay behind in Gath and to play no part in this mission.

“But my mom asked to speak with you first,” David says.

Jack freezes, wishing he could ignore the request. Jessie Shepherd is a hard woman, an extremely loving mother, and possibly Jack’s harshest critic in the Shepherd clan. Not that he blames her.

“Great,” Jack mutters, leaving David to finish the job of packing the ammunition.

“Mrs. Shepherd,” he says, as the screen door bangs shut behind him. Jessie turns and seems to consider him before gazing back into the forest. The sun is sinking low and he’ll have to get on the road soon.

“Major Benjamin,” she doesn’t sound overly hostile, just formal. “David won’t tell me the plan, claims I need to be ignorant of it in case anyone ever interrogates me. He says I’m not good at lying.”

“Shepherd family trait, I guess.”

“And you’re the opposite? Excessively good at lying?”

Jack shrugs and walks the final steps to stand next to her. “I’ve been told I am.”

“You’re not,” Jessie replies immediately. “I can see right through you.”

Jack smirks, his voice sarcastic and condescending, “And what do you see, Mrs. Shepherd?”

“I see how much you love my son.”

Jack’s face scrunches in annoyance. Jessie arrived yesterday to say “goodbye” to David and to take his brothers back home. Almost immediately, she’d taken up the hobby of watching Jack like a hawk. He’s used to attention, but her scrutiny was so intense, especially in his interactions with David, that he’d quickly made it his mission to avoid her.

When he doesn’t reply she continues, “But it’s the nature of your love I can’t see.”

_Thank God,_ he thinks.

“Love can be the greatest thing in the world when it is selfless, but it can also destroy everything in its path when it isn’t.”

“I don’t intend to turn on your son, if that is what you are asking,” Jack replies coldly.

“Every child is special to his mother, but I always knew David was something more, that he’d be special to more than just me or his family. I know that you see it too, that’s why you defended him in court when he was going to plead guilty to treason. I also heard what your father called you that day.”

Of course she’s referring to Silas calling him a faggot in front of the entire assembly. Jack tenses like a caged animal. She knows he’s gay.

“But I think David was too overwhelmed to notice the epithet. And he also told me about the baby.”

Jack turns to her, mouth opening to speak but she stops him with a mere wave of her hand. She would have made an excellent queen herself, able to command with a simple gesture. “It’s my grandchild, God willing that Michelle didn’t lose it. And I deserve to know, but he explained to me why it must be kept a secret.”

“Good,” Jack replies.

“So you wish to protect the baby?”

“Why wouldn’t I?” He glares at her, only to find her studying him again, so intense he quickly looks away.

“I asked you to come down here because I wanted to ask a favor.”

“What’s that?”

“Protect my son, and I don’t mean physically. He’s not as strong as he acts. He spends so much time worrying about other people, but he neglects himself. I’ve always considered it my job to worry about him. And now, he’s going somewhere that I can’t follow. I know you love him, but someday, Michelle and the baby will come back to him and what will you do then?”

“I don’t even know what you’re talking about. Why would I be anything but happy for them?” Jack hears it, the telltale crack in his voice signifying a lie. She’s right, he’s not as good a liar as he thinks, at least not when David is involved.

“He loves you too, Jack. I can see it.”

Jack turns back to her and there is kindness in her eyes. He doesn’t even snap at her for addressing him by his given name.

“He needs you, but not how you want,” she says. “He needs love and support, no matter what happens. And as unexpected as it is, I think  _you_  can give that to him, if you don’t let that ill-tempered personality of yours get in the way.”

Jack actually chuckles.

The screen door squeaks open and David and his brothers walk out.

“Are we interrupting?” David asks.

“No,” Jessie smiles at him, joy and despair colliding on her face. “Come here.”

She wraps David in a tight hug and Jack wishes he could escape, but they are blocking his path. He waits for them to wander down to the car, but he keeps watching, mesmerized by the tears, the hugs, and the kisses. He’d always assumed that other people were jealous of him when he was a child, because of the servants and the money. He was wrong. David was much luckier as a child.

He’s still standing there when David wanders back up to the porch, his eyes red with tears.

“I don’t know when I’ll seem them again.”

“But you _will_ see them again,” Jack responds.

“Do you think we’ll succeed tomorrow?”

Jack purses his lips. “There is no other option.”

“Except capture. You still agree, right, to be captured rather than kill anyone?”

“I think it’s idiocy, but I agree because you asked it.”

“No one will die for me.”

“When you are king, you’ll have to ask people to die for you.”

“I’m not king, and no one will die for me tomorrow.”

“Except four of your men if we are captured.”

“They know the risks. What did my mother say to you?”

“What do mothers always say? She told me to take care of you, that she’d skin me alive if I failed.”

“She didn’t say that last part, not to a prince.” David takes lethargic steps up the stairs and stands next to Jack.

After a few moments of silence, Jack finally works up the nerve to ask the question that’s been plaguing him, “What if my father’s there tomorrow?”

David squeezes his arm. “My men have been tracking his movements. He is still in Shiloh and there is no indication that he intends to be present when I’m turned over.”

“But what if he is?”

“Jack.” David turns him so they are face-to-face. “We will cross that bridge if and when we come to it.”

“I’ll kill him,” Jack hisses.

“He’s still your father. No matter what, just remember that.”

When Jack doesn’t respond, David cups his palm over Jack’s hand on the porch railing. “I take no joy in parting with you and I’ll pray for our victory.”

Jack’s stomach turns with desire. If not for Michelle, he would think that all of these gestures and conversations meant something. Fingers laced together. Whispered confessions under the starlight. David’s touch feels like home, even though it never can be. But it’s hard to remember that when words more suited to a lover are rolling off of David’s tongue.

_He needs you, but not how you want._ Jessie’s words flash through Jack’s mind and he jerks his hand away from David as if scalded.

“I had better be going,” he mutters, unable to look David in the eyes. He can feel his cheeks burning with desire and embarrassment. “See you tomorrow, in Gilboa.”

David smiles, but there is no joy, just worry, “See you tomorrow.”

* * *

Jack picks David’s four best soldiers for the mission: Ezra Mason, Jacob Tyler, Ben Donaghue, and Adam Osman. They’ve all excelled during the past three months of training, but more importantly, Jack can trust them.

They sneak into Gilboa that night _(Jack’s called-in favor #1),_ making camp outside Bethel, a town located about two hours south of the Gilboan-Gath border. It’s small, 10,000 citizens, with only one main street. Jack picked Bethel before he’d even seen the map of the convoy’s route, because it was the perfect place to free David. He hadn’t realized that Silas would make a spectacle of the event. He's blatantly printed the convoy’s route in the newspaper so that all of his citizens can come out to watch the traitor go by.

Silas loves theatrics, but it increases Jack’s concern over their success. Silas might be planning something or the parading convoy might be a decoy.

He can’t worry about it now, though. The plan is set.

The sun is beginning to rise over the hills in the distance and Jack calls the men to form a circle.

“Today, the entire future of Gilboa rests in our ten hands. Failure is not an option for this mission. We all know the plan, what Captain Shepherd desires, but I ask you to speak freely now regarding our contingency plan.”

The men nod solemnly.

“I know that Captain Shepherd wants no bloodshed. That’s what we all want. These soldiers, these citizens, are Gilboan, like us. You don’t fire at your own people. But I also will not allow Captain Shepherd to be taken to Shiloh, and I’m willing to prevent that at all costs. Are you?”

Jacob speaks up first, “If we open fire, sir, Captain Shepherd will never forgive us.”

“He might be an idealist, but he’s also a soldier. He understands that death is a part of war, no matter how much we wish it wasn’t. Besides, we will try every other plan first, and if anyone dies today, it will be on me. As your commanding officer, only I will make the call to open fire. Shepherd will only be angry at me. But I need to know that you are with me in this, that when I give the command, you’ll follow it.”

In the silence that follows, Jack realizes he has to give them more. A commanding officer must be strong and unfailing, but occasionally the men need to see the vulnerability underneath.

“Because we go up against Gilboan soldiers, I swear I will do everything in my power to prevent death,” he says. “But we did not start this battle. My father started this. My father pitted Gilboan against Gilboan. I’ve lost men before, twelve men.” He gazes into his hands, clasped tightly in front of him. “I will not lose my men again. I will not lose any of you.” He looks at each of them in turn, holding eye contact until he sees the understanding register in their eyes. “If we are captured, you will all die, and I won’t let that happen. I promise I won’t give the command to open fire until I absolutely believe that there is no other option. But if that happens, if I ask you to open fire, I need to know that you’ll follow my command.”

Lieutenant Ezra Mason starts to nod his head first, lips pursed together in thought. “Yes, sir.”

The other men follow, each in his own time when he’s ready to agree.

“Then may God be on our side today,” Jack replies, “so that nobody will have to die.”


	6. If you'll be my star, I'll be your sky

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from Gregory & the Hawk's "Boats and Birds."

Jack and the men take up their positions in Bethel. Jacob, the best shooter other than Jack, is stationed on the roof of the library. Jack assumes that there will be at least two Gilboan snipers stationed on high buildings in each town on the route, but the two most obvious choices in Bethel are the department store and the Town Hall. Ben and Adam are tasked with taking Silas’ snipers out by non-lethal means and then positioning themselves as secondary snipers.

Jack and Ezra pick up two armored Humvees stashed in the woods five miles north of Bethel along with a rocket launcher _(Jack’s Called-in Favor #2)._

The convoy will pass through Bethel at 1:00 pm and around noon the townspeople begin lining the streets, like a parade but without the exuberance. It’s better than Jack could have hoped, a somber crowd. They still support David Shepherd and aren’t happy to see him in chains.

Ten minutes before the convoy enters Bethel, soldiers sweep the streets for the third and final time, searching for anything suspicious. But everything looks to be perfectly in order in the tiny town, a perfect drive-through for Silas’ demented parade. Except Jack, Ezra and the two Humvees are parked in the woods a mile away and Silas’ two snipers are two minutes from being taken out by Ben and Adam.

Jacob, stationed on top of the library building, speaks through Jack’s earpiece, “Major, last sweep is complete. Operation is a go.”

Jack jumps into one Humvee and Ezra, with the rocket launcher in tow, hops into the other. They are off. It’s impossible to cut off the convoy directly in the downtown due to the barricades, but at the end of the street Jack can head them off by traveling directly down their exit route. Ezra has to sweep around town and cut them off from behind.

Seven minutes later, Jack’s pulling into a side street, right before the southern end of the downtown. If Silas’ snipers are still present, they will see him.

“Ben, Adam, have you taken up your positions?” They opted for first names on this mission, the element of some anonymity in case their frequency is being monitored.

“Roger,” they both reply.

Everyone is in place. Jack takes a breath, calms his nerves and waits for the rumbling of the convoy. It seems to take forever, more than the two minutes that tick by on his watch. At the first sound, he knocks the vehicle into gear and slowly pulls onto the main thoroughfare, angling his Humvee to block the road. The first vehicle in the convoy, an armored Jeep, slows to a stop thirty feet away while the armored transport vehicle pulls alongside it.

A beat. Complete silence. The civilians lining the streets start looking at each other in confusion and concern. People in the windows of the three-story brick buildings press their faces to the glass, eyes wide with wonder.

In his earpiece he hears Ezra’s voice, “Major, I’ve pulled in behind the convoy. Everything is in place.”

Jack opens the door and steps out, hands in the air. He’s dressed in a Gilboan military uniform, black coat, golden buttons done up perfectly. He needs the townspeople to remember that he isn’t the enemy; he’s one of them.

He hears the collective gasp of the crowd, whispers of the prince that roll through the townspeople like a wave. He steps around the vehicle door slowly, arms raised and empty despite the gun holstered at his hip.

The front doors to the Gilboan Jeep open and two soldiers slide out, guns raised at Jack as they take cover behind the vehicle’s opened doors.

Jack takes a deep breath and thinks of David, his smile, his strength, his charisma. He tries to channel it.

“Citizens of Gilboa,” he says, voice strong and confident, “I have come to save the rightful king of our nation, David Shepherd.”

Everyone is silent, fixated on Jack.

“I am the crown prince of this country. From my youth, I was destined to take my father’s place on the throne. I, of all people, should hate David Shepherd. And yet, I follow him. I pledge myself to him. He is God’s chosen king and so today, I beg you to do what is right and grant him his freedom.”

It’s just the opening of the script, the spectacle. He knows it won’t work, but this performance is for the people of Bethel. He needs them to question their loyalty.

“Major Benjamin, stand down,” it’s Colonel Forman. He’s stepped out from the transport vehicle, a semi-automatic in his hands. But it’s pointed downward, not a direct threat yet.

“David Shepherd is no traitor,” Jack continues loudly, his words are still for the civilians. “He has never committed treason against Gilboa and only fights for the future freedom and prosperity of its citizens. I won’t let you deliver him to a firing squad. I have three snipers with eyes trained on you right now. So, I ask that you stand down, Colonel.”

The townspeople of Bethel are all silent and entranced, eyes darting between Prince Jack and Colonel Forman.

Jack drops his hands, making it clear that he isn’t going for his weapon, but he also isn’t afraid of Colonel Forman and his soldiers. He’s in control here, “As crown prince of Gilboa, I command you to stand down and turn over David Shepherd or my men will open fire.”

Colonel Forman shakes his head.

Jack speaks quietly into his headset, “Jacob, give me three warning shots. Take out tires if you can.”

Nothing happens.

“Jacob?” Jack’s stomach drops. Something’s wrong. “Adam? Ben?”

“Ezra? I need that explosion now…Ezra?”

Colonel Forman turns to the Jeep, opening the back door.

King Silas steps out.

The citizens of Bethel gasp and bow their heads. Silas raises his hands to them, the greeting of a king, and then straightens his jacket as he turns to his son.

Violence thrums through Jack’s body, making his skin tingle and his fingers twitch.

The world narrows to just his father walking slowly toward him and the sound of his hammering heart. His conversation with David last night rings in his ears.

_“What if my father is there tomorrow?”_

Without thinking, Jack pulls his handgun from the holster and points it at Silas. The crowd gasps and starts to fidget. The soldiers behind the King tense and, for a second, Silas freezes before motioning his men to stand down. He continues walking toward Jack, confident and unafraid.

“Son.” His voice is low and rumbling and so incredibly familiar that it instantly breaks something inside of Jack. He starts shaking violently, the gun vibrating in his hand, “You’re going to shoot your own father? Commit patricide and regicide all in one?

“Stop walking.” Jack’s voice cracks and a single tear cuts a path down his cheek. He hopes that Jacob will be strong enough to shoot the king if Jack’s proves unable…and then he remembers that Jacob didn’t answer when he asked him to open fire. Jacob is probably already dead. All of David’s men are probably dead.

Jack is on his own. He just has to move his index finger an inch; it’s the easiest thing in the world, pulling the trigger. He practiced it so many times on the lawn in Gath, imagining his father. He just has to pull the trigger.

“You’ve aligned yourself with a known traitor, but you can still be forgiven, Jack. You can still come back to your mother and me if you stand down.”

“You’re the traitor,” Jack says, barely a whisper. Still his finger won’t move.

“’For Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light,’” Silas quotes, “You know that the Devil comes as a temptation, as someone like David Shepherd.”

“The Devil is you,” Jack replies, but his voice comes out as weak through the tears.

“Come back to me, son,” Silas is directly in front of him now, the gun in Jack’s hand shaking and mere inches from his father’s chest. “Come back to me.”

Silas raises his hand slowly, telegraphing his movements. Jack knows what he’s doing but he’s paralyzed. Silas’ right hand closes around the barrel of the gun and gently pulls it from his son’s grasp. Jack drops his empty hands to his sides and cries. Defeated.

The crowd and the soldiers are as silent as the grave, transfixed on the royal drama playing out before them.

Silas leans in until his lips are almost touching Jack’s ear and whispers so only Jack can hear, “I hope David Shepherd’s cock was worth it.”

The tears are so full and hot in Jack’s eyes that the world becomes fuzzy. He closes them, bows his head and tries not to sob. He’s failed David and Joseph and himself. He’s failed his men…again. He’s failed everyone and now David will die and Jack will be thrown into another prison.

Quick as lightning, Silas strikes the side of Jack’s head with the butt of the handgun. He cries out, hears a few gasps of shock from the crowd and falls to his knees as pain blooms in his head and radiates down his spine.

His entire body is shaking with tears, from the pain and from his failure. He kneels in front of his father, head bowed in apparent supplication.

Silas bends slightly at the waist, still above Jack, still better than Jack, but low enough that he can speak in Jack’s ear, “You think I didn’t know about your plan, dear child, to capture David in Bethel? I am the king and I _know_ everything. I _see_ everything.”

He stands up and takes a step back, leaving Jack kneeling and broken at his feet.

“The lure of the Devil has trapped both of my children,” Silas says to the crowd. “David Shepherd is a plague upon this nation, bringing war and death, turning my own son against me. The plague ends here and you, dear citizens of Bethel, will bear the burden of witness. Bring the other traitors to me.”

Jack glances over to see Jacob, Adam, Ben and Ezra walking at gunpoint, hands clasped atop their heads. His father has bested him at every turn. He knew about the snipers, about the other Humvee, about Jack. The day belongs to King Silas.

The other four men are pushed to their knees, rifles trained on them. Jack looks back down at the pavement, for fear of the anger and betrayal that will be in the men’s eyes. He let them down. He could have simply pulled the trigger and rid the world of Silas’ tyranny, but when the moment came, he couldn’t.

“For your role in attempting to free a known traitor of Gilboa and for entering our borders without permission to stage a guerilla attack, I accuse you four of terrorism. You will be transported to Shiloh to await trial.”

The tears begin to abate, replaced by the emptiness of loss. It was an arrogant plan, too reliant on a bluff and the citizens’ love of David. And now Jack is paying the price for his arrogance. He’s signed the death warrants of five men and deprived Gilboa of its future.

He’s so lost in despair that he doesn’t notice the shifting of the crowd or the shadows that are dancing across the pavement under his knees. It isn’t until he hears Ezra murmur in complete confusion “Butterflies?” that Jack rouses and looks up for the first time since his father hit him.

He stops breathing. Despite the crisp autumn air, the sky is darkening with a sea of black and orange butterflies, hundreds of them fluttering and descending above him. They form a huge erratic cylinder, a flowing circle of life, making their way toward the ground.

Silas raises his hands as if in prayer, Jack’s gun still clasped limply in his right hand. The townspeople are awestruck and Jack hears the murmurings of _God_ and _divine intervention._

“Citizens,” Silas says, voice booming with joy, “I am your rightful king, sanctioned by God, and the rebellion led by David Shepherd that has caused so much pain and death to our dear nation, it ends here. It ends today.”

Jack stands, mesmerized by the sea of flapping insects, swirling haphazardly above him and his father. For a split second he thinks that God has forsaken David, thrown his support behind King Silas again, but then he sees the break in the circle, a fissure that cuts through the butterflies right above his father’s head.

When Jack raises his hand, a butterfly lands delicately on his index finger, and Silas’ face contorts in confusion.

Not a single butterfly has landed except this one. They remain a swirling vortex, looking for their king.

The corner of Jack’s mouth tilts up. “They’re not here for you.”

Silas’ mouth drops open and Jack walks past him, freely. Silas doesn’t even raise his gun, too confused and transfixed to act. The soldiers, too, let him pass as the butterfly on his finger takes to the air again, joining the swarm that flits above Jack’s head, following him, trusting him. But they never land on his head, not that he expects it.

He stops in front of the armored transport vehicle like a butterfly shepherd, the swarm pulsing above him, and everyone is trapped in the wonder of it, unable to resist when he commands a soldier to unlock the holding compartment in the back. Instantly the butterflies surge into the compartment. Jack holds his breath and waits.

When David emerges, he’s squinting as he steps into the light, a ring of monarch butterflies on the top of his head.

“A living crown,” someone in the crowd gasps and David steps away from the vehicle, searching the faces until he finds Jack. His mouth spreads into a magnificent smile, perfect teeth and full lips. He looks like an angel sent by God, his hands upturned as butterflies alight upon them, the butterflies on his head slowly fanning their wings, making the crown shimmer in the sunlight.

It’s the most beautiful thing Jack has ever seen. If there was any doubt of his loyalty before, it has evaporated. He’ll follow David anywhere, into battle, into exile, into death.

David walks past him and toward Silas with his crown and a stream of butterflies flapping behind him, like a royal cloak billowing in the wind. Jack follows in the wake, in awe like everyone else, including King Silas. David looks like a king, young and strong and beautiful. Silas just looks like a bitter old man.

David stops in front of him and with the flick of his wrist all of the butterflies take to the air, floating silently upward, hovering and flapping ten feet above his head.

“Cuff this man,” Silas growls through clenched teeth at a nearby soldier. The soldier simply stares at David. Silas turns to the soldier, livid. “This man is an imposter. Cuff him!”

The soldier’s mouth drops open in confusion. Like all of the other Gilboan soldiers, he seems stunned into inaction by the wave of butterflies still dancing above David. For years, they’ve been lulled into loyalty by the story of King Silas’ butterfly crown. Jack is sure that none of them will be able to turn their weapons on David now.

Slowly, eyes wide with anger, Silas raises the handgun until it is pointed at David’s chest. Jack can feel the change in the crowd of civilians that are lining the streets. They begin to shift and pulse, like the ocean in a storm. Some cry out in indignation, with words of _God_ and _Chosen One._

“King Silas,” David says, seemingly unaffected by the gun pointed at his chest. Jack looks around and sees a dozen phones pointed at them, recording this moment. “I am no traitor to Gilboa, but I could not stand by and watch as your nation and Gath destroyed one another. I turned myself over to Premier Shaw and in good faith, he handed me over to you. Jack and my men acted without the knowledge or consent of Gath. On my father’s grave, I promise you that.”

Silas is silent with rage and the gun is still pointed at David’s chest. Jack desperately wishes he had a weapon. He looks to his four soldiers, also unarmed but they are standing now, weapons no longer pointed at their backs.

“So, I make you a promise today.” David’s voice is still strong and filled with purpose. “I will leave your nation and the nation of Gath, if you will stop this endless war. If you will stop sending your nation’s sons into battle.”

“You do not tell me what to do,” Silas mutters, voice dark and filled with rage.

“Then shoot me now,” David replies and Jack’s body jerks in fear, as do the soldiers standing next to him and the people in the crowd. This was not a part of the plan, but neither was the presence of Silas or the butterfly crown, so they are a bit off script at this point.

“And lose your nation forever,” Jack interjects, desperately trying to deflect his father’s anger, because he is still too focused on David to notice that the favor of the crowd is shifting away from him. Silas’ eyes turn to Jack for the first time, studying him. He looks as if he’s never seen his son before and he is now looking upon a stranger.

“Father.” Jack's voice is low, just for Silas, not for the crowd. “You can’t capture every camera phone that is pointed on you right now. You can’t silence every citizen who looks upon you. You won’t be able to destroy the evidence of what happened here today. And how long will it take for your citizens to turn on you if you shoot the man who wears the living crown of God? How long will it take for all of it to slip through your fingers after you’ve taken away our future?”

Silas’ face is red with anger. He’s looking at Jack with more betrayal than he ever has before.

“I promise the citizens of Gilboa this,” David says, despite the fact that Silas is still trying to burn a hole through his son with the fury of his glare. “If King Silas allows me, Jack, and my men to leave this nation, I will seek political asylum in Austeria and not return. But when the day comes that Gilboa is without a king, if she’ll have me, I will serve her. That is my promise.”

“Checkmate,” Jack whispers and smirks, because Silas’ eyes are still focused entirely on him, dark with betrayal.

Silas lowers the weapon and finally looks to the people of Bethel, sees the adoration in their eyes now turned away from him and toward David.

He’s losing them.

But he isn’t a man to give up easily. He knows when to fight and when to regroup, when to be benevolent and when to be strong. Despite his fits of arrogance and rage, Silas has always been pragmatic.

His voice is booming when he finally speaks, “We have truly seen a miracle. I will not deny this nation her future or her chance for peace.”

The citizens are entranced, amazed that they are bearing witness to this event. Jack just shakes his head, because of course his father is trying to turn this to his favor, make himself look loving and forgiving. And the bastard will probably succeed. He is a master of manipulation, when he isn’t blacked out on rage and spitting hatred.

“I, King Silas, ask that David Shepherd be given safe passage out of my lands. For as long as he keeps his promise to remain _in Austeria,_ rather than inciting violence and rebellion from his haven in Gath, I will serve my citizens as I always have. I will maintain the peace and prosperity of our magnificent nation.”

He steps aside and his eyes turn to Jack, so cold and betrayed that Jack freezes like a deer caught in the headlights. He blames Jack for this and the look promises suffering.

But there is nothing Silas can do, too many witnesses, too many people whose loyalty could easily slip from Silas’ grasp if he lashes out. And rebellions are like dominoes, once one town falls, once some people begin to tumble away from their king, many more will follow.

So he grudgingly takes a step back and let’s Jack walk past him, but his eyes never leave his son's even as Jack slides into the Humvee beside David and his four soldiers.


	7. Stood on the edge tied to the noose

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because I'm crazy, I made a map of Gilboa and the surrounding nations. From here, the story starts to incorporate other places. Here's the link to the map:
> 
>  
> 
> [Map of Gilboa](http://timidtimbuktu.tumblr.com/image/87727994378)
> 
>  
> 
> Chapter title from "Amsterdam" by Coldplay.

David, Jack and their fellow soldiers hop on a small plane in an airfield outside Bethel _(Jack’s called-in favor #3)_ and fly east into Ammon, stopping to refuel and to pick up four more of David’s men _(Jack’s called-in favor #4)._ Then they continue east to Austeria, a large, prosperous democracy in the mountainous interior of the continent.

Austeria and Gath have long been allies. Although Austeria chose to remain neutral during the recent war, they helped Gath when they could, allowing political refugees to find sanctuary behind their borders when necessary. That was the reason Jack had sought political asylum for David here, they were likely to grant it and they have the strength to maintain it.

Jack, David and his eight soldiers take up residence in a large house in the expensive, gated section of Austeria’s capital, Bozrah, a city of over a million people that lies in a lush river valley under jagged limestone peaks _(Jack’s called-in favor #5 – with a healthy side of money from his secret Moab bank account)._

* * *

Reports of David’s escape begin to filter into the international news networks, but there is never any leaked footage from Bethel. Silas seems to have contained the event, possibly erased every recording from a camera phone, and silenced the townspeople, probably with threats. Jack worries every minute that he will retaliate against them, find a way to smuggle a sniper into Austeria and put a bullet in David’s head.

“We’re not safe,” Jack pleads with David the day of their arrival, “and you just wandered down the street to the grocery store. You can’t do that, David.”

“I won’t be a prisoner and lock myself in here,” David replies, staring out of the window, which causes Jack’s fingers to twitch with anxiety. He really wishes that David would just step away from the window. He’s waiting for the gunshot, for the splash of blood as David’s head whips back.

“Please, can you just step back from the window.” Jack’s voice is strained and David finally looks at him, studies the fear in his eyes. He steps away from the window.

“Your father is just a man, Jack. He’s not omnipresent or omniscient. He’s just a man, who quite honestly has tried to kill me a few times, and I’m still here.”

“Because of God?”

It’s true, Jack can’t deny it, but he thinks it’s dangerous to take God’s protection for granted, to simply prance around with the certainty that God will intervene because he always has before. That seems like the type of arrogance that God finds annoying.

“You aren’t safe,” Jack repeats.

“Nobody is ever safe,” David tilts his head and smiles warmly. “You know that just as well as I do; you’re a soldier too. On the battlefield, the minute you fear death too much, so much that you let it consume you and control you, that’s when death comes for you.”

When Jack frowns and starts to kick at the Persian carpet under his feet, David steps toward him and says, “You’re father is set to give a press conference in two days. Let’s just see what he says. Okay?”

Jack nods, but he is still filled with anxiety, waiting for the bullet, waiting for the blood.

* * *

Two days later, David has commandeered a bar in their new neighborhood. Silas is going to give an official statement in a few minutes about the peace treat between Gilboa and Gath, about David Shepherd’s harrowing escape. David is wary but hopeful, so he’s already ordered a round of beers for the men.

Jack is just wary, obsessively spinning his beer glass on the table without drinking. He knows his father. Silas has been humiliated and he will absolutely fire back.

“Shh,” David says to the crowd as King Silas’ face appears on screen. The speech is all pomp. He pontificates on how great his nation is and the power of their military. Finally he officially acknowledges that the land north of the Prosperity River belongs to Gath and that the fighting is over. David and the men cheer and drink.

“As many of you know there are rumors coming out of Bethel about a butterfly crown. I want to officially put those rumors to rest here and now.” Silas continues, “The rumors are true.”

Jack glances at David and sees the mirror of his own expression, worry turning into shock.

“I want to share with you exclusive footage of the event.”

The image cuts away to a grainy camera-phone video of David walking toward Silas with his butterfly crown and cloak. He is just as resplendent as Jack remembers. The video cuts back to Silas.

“When God chose to anoint me with a living crown of butterflies, I was ten years away from actually wearing the crown of Gilboa. God wasn’t proclaiming me king. He wasn’t demanding that a crown be placed on my head. He was giving me a message.” He pauses dramatically. “That it was time to begin. He was presenting me with a challenge and hoping that I would rise to it. We was asking me to _earn_ the true crown through my actions.”

The image cuts away to the video again. Silas has edited out his outburst, asking a soldier to handcuff David only to watch his command go unanswered. Instead, he plays the video of David honoring Silas’ right to the throne, calling him the King of Gilboa and asking him to grant David free passage out of his country so that he may seek asylum in Austeria.

The video cuts back to Silas, who remains firm and commanding, “David Shepherd stood in my courtroom and pleaded guilty to treason.”

“Oh God,” Jack mutters, fear starting to seep its way back into his body.

“As a consequence, he was convicted of treason, for which the punishment is death by firing squad. This is not a crime that I take lightly, and I will not simply pardon Shepherd because of the incident three days ago.”

“What’s he doing?” David asks quietly.

“I have no idea,” Jack replies.

“But I will honor God’s wish that David be given a chance to earn his crown, to _earn_ his pardon of the crime of treason for which he is guilty. He has willingly traveled to Austeria in good faith because he knows that I am the rightful king, and he is accepting his punishment for his crimes. Three days ago, in Bethel, God asked Shepherd to use his self-imposed exile, his punishment, to work for the forgiveness of the Gilboan people, to earn your trust and loyalty just as I did many years ago.

“When God called upon me, we were a nation torn asunder, at war. To earn God’s love and the crown, I united our nation with Carmel and Selah, and in that union we have prospered.”

“You slippery little worm,” Jack whispers, partly in annoyance, but partly in awe. Apparently his father can turn anything to his favor, even God choosing another king in front of hundreds of his citizens. Jack had been expecting Silas to deny everything, to push down rebellion by silencing the citizens of Bethel. Except that would never work and Silas knows it. When you tighten your grip, that is when your citizens revolt. But this…openly acknowledging the event while rewriting the narrative of it for his own gain…this might work. The fucking asshole might succeed.

“I have finally ended our war with Gath, signing the peace treaty yesterday,” Silas continues. “We will finally know peace and in this, I know that I have served my subjects well. But the Philistine nations to the north still lie in wait to destroy us.

“Before Gilboa was even a nation, Austeria, Gath and Ammon fought a bloody war against the nation of Philistia…and won. As you know, after the war, in order to prevent further fighting, Austeria fractured the nation of Philistia into three parts: Ekron, Ashdod and Ashkelon. Broken apart, these nations had no military strength and were no longer a threat. Austeria presumed that they had solved the problem, but even now Ekron and Ashdod are reasserting their union, turning their gaze to the south, longing for blood. I know not when they will strike, a year, ten, a hundred? But I fear that they will. I fear for the future of our nation, and that is why I knew that I had to answer God’s request three days ago in Bethel.”

“This fucking asshole is going to do it,” Jack mutters, now just in awe of his father’s skills of manipulation.

“David Shepherd’s time has come to prove himself worthy to God, and I will not stand in the way of that. That is why I allowed him safe passage to Austeria, a nation that I hope may one day be our ally despite the past, despite their long friendship with Gath. That is why I will not pursue my right to carry out his sentence of death _for as long as he remains in Austeria.”_

He glances downward as a small smile creeps onto his face. The bar is dead silent, everyone captivated like moths to the glowing television. When Silas looks up, his expression is kind and relaxed for the first time.

“I know David Shepherd well,” he says. “I believe that deep inside he is a good man, moral, with conviction. I hope that he will prove himself worthy of the challenge that God has laid at his feet, just as I did decades ago when God granted me a living crown.”

Silas pauses. His father is the most manipulative asshole on the planet, but Jack can’t deny his giddiness, knowing that Silas has acknowledged David’s (eventual) right to the throne, knowing that he will (probably) cease his assassination attempts as long as David remains in Austeria. It is an obvious victory and the men turn to David to smile.

But Jack should know his father well enough to know that he never gives without also taking.

King Silas takes a deep breath. “Finally, I must discuss one more thing with my citizens, something that is very personal. Prince Jonathan Benjamin, my son.”

Jack feels David’s eyes turn to him, concerned, but Jack can’t tear his eyes away from his father’s face. He can almost hear the proverbial shoe dropping.

“You can imagine my wife’s and my joy when she gave birth to our beautiful twins, a son and a daughter. Jack and Michelle changed my entire view on the world. They lit it up, filled it with hope and happiness.”

Jack can feel the anxiety growing. Something terrible is coming.

“Over a year ago, I almost lost my son when he was taken hostage by Gath. Only a father can understand my joy when he was returned to me, by David Shepherd. And though, my son did not die, I lost him that day and I simply didn’t know it yet. Because of his jealousy of Shepherd, a darkness started to grow in his heart. A darkness that caused him to ally himself with William Cross and to lead a failed coup against me.”

Jack wishes that David would stop looking at him.

“During the coup, Jack showed his true colors. He and William Cross were responsible for the cold-blooded deaths of delegates and one of my secretaries. Jack even threatened the life of his own mother.”

Silas' stone-cold gaze is holding Jack, as if he is in the room rather than hundreds of miles away, laying Jack’s sins bare for the world to see.

“Despite these incidences, I let my son live because he is my son and I love him. Sometimes when I look at him, I still see the tiny, helpless babe I held in my hands decades ago, rather than the cruel, selfish man he has become. Anyone who is a parent can understand my turmoil, but as your king, I must always place my kingdom above anything else…and in regards to Jack, I have not.”

The report cuts to footage from Bethel, not Silas hitting his own son, but the footage of Jack pointing a gun at the unarmed king as Silas tries to reason with him. Jack’s stomach turns.

The report cuts back to Silas’ face.

“Much to my dismay, Jack has aligned himself with David Shepherd, who has been tasked by God to earn a crown, to be stronger and braver than he has ever been before," Silas says. "When I saw that living crown upon David’s head, I suddenly understood why my son had forsaken his family and his nation and insinuated himself into Shepherd’s inner circle. Because despite everything I have done to try to help Jack, to try to save him from himself, he is lost to me. He wants only one thing, to sit on the throne of Gilboa, and he will destroy anything, murder anyone, to achieve that goal.”

Jack’s whole body is starting to shake.

“To show my citizens that there is nothing I place above the prosperity of this nation, I do what I am about to do...something I should have done long ago,” he pauses, dramatically before continuing, “I strip Jonathan Benjamin of his title of prince. I strip him of his military rank of major. I strip him of his citizenship. And I strip him of his family name, Benjamin. He has turned on this nation, on his family…on all of us.

“Today, I make the ultimate sacrifice for my citizens, the sacrifice of my own flesh and blood, in the hope that you will never have to suffer under his tyranny. I strip him of any claim he thinks he has on this throne. He possesses none of the privileges of his previous titles or citizenship. He is cast out into the world. He is no longer my son. He is nothing to me.”

Jack’s eyes fall closed and he grips his beer glass so hard he thinks it might shatter in his hand. He wishes it would shatter, merely for the release of physical pain. There is complete silence in the bar except for Jack’s thumping heart and Silas’ deep voice.

“Thank you, citizens of Gilboa, for listening. This has been a trying time for our nation, but now that we are free—“

“Turn it off,” David says. Ezra hops up and quickly shuts off the television. Jack wishes he hadn’t, because the silence, the knowledge that everyone is looking at him, hurts more than his father’s words. Jack stares into his beer, too broken to cry or speak or move or even look up. His father has told the world of his crimes and disowned him. He hates his father enough that it shouldn’t hurt, but it does.

_He is nothing to me._

“It’s true,” Jack mutters. His voice is quiet but in the stunned silence of the bar he knows that the men can hear him. “During the coup, I…”

He closes his eyes, trying to bottle the guilt. Before his coronation, before he turned the gun on his sister and mother, he had ordered a man to be shot in cold blood. Not in self defense, not in battle, and there can be no forgiveness for it. Ever.

The silence stretches, but Jack deserves it. He deserves their condemnation.

“To Major Benjamin,” Ezra says, raising his glass into the air. Jack jerks and looks at him, “because without your brilliant command three days ago, we wouldn’t be here.”

“Major Benjamin,” Adam stands up next to Ezra.

Jack’s heart is constricting in his chest, but not because of turmoil, it’s…confusion and gratitude. He doesn’t deserve this kindness.

“To Major Benjamin,” Jacob says.

The other men follow. Finally, after every man has spoken, David, who is sitting next to Jack, stands and raises his glass.

“To Jack,” he says, smiling and Jack smiles back.

The men yell out and drink. In the roar, quiet enough that only Jack can hear, David whispers “my king” before the glass touches his lips and he drinks.

* * *

David and Jack are slightly drunk after Jack orders another three rounds of beer. He is still amazed by their acceptance in light of his sins, happy despite his father’s words. He had been spiraling into hopelessness and then in one beautiful moment, Ezra Mason had raised his glass and saved Jack from the fall. Jack will never forget that Ezra started it.

The men are still drinking, but David pulls Jack out of the bar, claiming he wants to talk. They amble down the road together.

“Ezra’s right, that was an amazing rescue, Jack,” David says, bumping his shoulder into Jack’s arm as they walk.

“Yeah, except we’d all be in a prison in Shiloh right now if not for the butterfly intervention.”

“Butterfly intervention?” David is giggling, because he’s drunk. He looks amazing when he’s drunk, cheeks flushed and eyes bright.

“David, what my father said about—“

“Don’t even finish that thought,” David turns grave, but he still wobbles slightly from the booze as he tries to stand up straight. “He was just trying to hurt you…and he was probably trying to drive a wedge between us. I can’t control if he succeeds in the former but he will never succeed in the latter.”

Jack closes his eyes and sighs, tilting his head up toward the night sky, simply enjoying the buzz, not just of alcohol but of true friendship and freedom.

“What you said back there in the bar,” Jack says quietly, looking back down at David, “You said ‘my king’ before you drank.”

David nods, “I know it hurt you when I betrayed you during the coup and I’m sorry.”

“Don’t. My uncle had all of the control. And Silas’ words are true. I did horrible things…unforgivable things.” He can barely say the words for shame, now that his crimes are known.

“I know, but,” David takes a step forward, he’s so close that Jack can’t catch his breath, “when I told you later that I wouldn’t have supported you even if Silas were dead and your uncle wasn’t there, I’m sorry for that.”

“You were just being honest.”

“I meant it at the time, but only because I still didn’t know you. But I know you now and I take it back.”

“David—“

“No. Listen,” David eyes are glassy and warm with drink, and possibly joy, as he stares at Jack. A piece of blond hair is hanging over his forehead. Jack wants to brush it aside, but he resists.

“If I had it to do all over again, I wouldn’t get Silas. I would stay by your side and help. You say you did horrible things during the coup, that’s between you and God. It’s not for me to judge. But I know you felt alone and trapped by William and your father…by the situation. I should have stayed, because maybe then I could have saved you from doing those things.”

“It wasn’t your job to save me,” Jack replies, but he wishes that David had, that David would.

“If I’d known you then like I know you now, I would have stayed and helped. That’s why I said _that_ in the bar. So that you would know that I'm sorry.”

“Don’t ever say it again.”

“Why not?”

Jack kneels down on the sidewalk and takes David’s hand in his. David is definitely drunk because he giggles suddenly and says, “Are you proposing to me?”

Jack lets go of his hand, embarrassed, “You are such an asshole.”

“That’s usually not the best way to start,” David giggles.

“I’m pledging my loyalty to you.”

“You don’t have to. I told you that I didn’t believe your father’s lies.”

“Just give me your hand,” Jack says and David chuckles again while placing his hand in Jack’s. It’s so wonderful to see him happy and carefree, if only for a moment. Jack is about to start laughing too, so he takes a deep breath and begins, “David Shepherd—“

“That’s a much better start to a proposal.”

“Stop…David Shepherd, I, Jonathan Benjamin, pledge my loyalty to you. You are the rightful king of Gilboa and I promise that I will do everything in my power to help you in your endeavor to return to our nation and serve as her sovereign. I will give anything I can, my skills, my time, the money from my secret bank accounts. You are my king and someday you will be the king of Gilboa. That is my promise.”

David is no longer giggling. He looks moved. Without warning he drops to his knees, eyes level with Jack.

“Then make me this promise, that you will never kneel to me again. You are my equal, my friend. You have already done so much for me, helped me in ways you can’t imagine. I am not king yet. But even if I become king, you will not kneel to me like a subject. Do you understand?”

Jack wants to kiss him, in part because his lips look so full and incredibly kissable, but also because of his kindness. He’s about to lean in and touch David’s lips because he’s drunk and not thinking clearly. Then David’s left hand moves against Jack’s right forearm and Jack feels the scrape of the cold metal on David’s finger.

Michelle’s ring.

_What the fuck is he doing, coveting a man who is in love with his sister?_

Jack wobbles slightly backward and pulls his hands from David’s. “I think I drank too much.”

He isn’t that drunk, but he needs to cover the blushing of his cheeks.

“Come on,” David drags him up and they start walking down the sidewalk again, but it feels awkward now, because Jack still wants to lean over and kiss him. When they pass by a tree, Jack only wants to push David against it and taste those lips. He is almost drunk enough to do it.

He hasn’t been with a man in months and his desire is like a raging inferno. He just needs to make it back to his room so he can alleviate the desire himself. Then, he needs to find some men in Austeria to help lessen the need.

Yes, as soon as he can, he’ll find a few men in Bozrah who are versed in the art of discretion.

“So what do we do now?” David asks after the long lull in the conversation.

Jack’s brain is still focused on sex, so he almost says, _We could fuck._

Instead he just grunts, “Hmmm?”

“Now that we are in Austeria, what do we do for our people?”

Of course, that’s what David meant.

 _We could still fuck_ , Jack thinks, because he’s still definitely drunk and ridiculously horny, _That might help the people of Gilboa…somehow_ …Jack can figure out those details later.

“Even monarchs need friends, support from other nations,” Jack responds. It’s hard to focus on a serious topic like this with his brain still humming with booze, but at least it distracts him from his libido. “We need to build support for you and despite my bank accounts, we will need more money and donors. And Silas is right about one thing, Austeria would be a good ally and we are well-placed to take advantage.”

“Good,” David replies, swinging his arms slightly in happiness, “Then we’ll start tomorrow.”

“Fuck, David, can we take a week to rest and then we can go about saving the world and all that shit?”

David laughs, “Okay, one week and then we save the world.”

* * *

David means it. He gives the men exactly one week of relaxation, part of which Jack spends cruising the club scene in Bozrah, finding the best gay hangouts that aren’t _officially_ gay hangouts. Then David puts them to work.

Jack jumps into it, meeting with Austerian senators and, when possible, diplomats and potential rich donors from Ammon and Moab and Britain and France when they are in the country. He’s good at this, actually, so he gladly loses himself to the work. He also manages to find a couple of cute men, Robert and Frank, who he meets when he can. It isn’t as much action as he used to get, but it’s enough to lessen his attraction to David to a low boil, enough that Jack doesn’t do anything stupid like push him against a tree and kiss him just because they are alone and drunk.

Jack still wants to, he’ll probably always want to.

The weeks roll by and they are busy. David doesn’t talk about Michelle as much, even though he must still worry about her – Jack worries about her too. A lot.

Despite Silas’ accusations, the men still seem to trust Jack. They train together and drink together. He tries to identify which men have diplomatic potential, like Ezra, and he brings them on meetings to observe and eventually to talk.

When Jack can get away unnoticed, he meets up with Robert or Frank. It is just sex, but he’s always liked sex, so it’s better than nothing.

He never goes to the gay clubs, but there are a couple of good mixed clubs in Bozrah. He even drags David and Ezra along, even though it doesn’t seem to be their scene. But sometimes he just wants to laugh and drink and people-watch with them at swanky clubs rather than the dive-bars they always choose. They seem to realize this, so they go along when he asks, dance with girls even though Ezra is the only one who ever gets to first base (or beyond) with any of them.

When he doesn’t ask David and Ezra to come to the clubs with him, he’s cruising, looking for a cute boy for the night.

After six months they settle into a comfortable routine. Jack’s life revolves around David: meetings, political functions, drinks at the bar, strategy walks with David in the park regardless of the weather which turns cold and snowy as winter envelops Austeria.

He accepts that he is content, not happy, but content. He appreciates it because even contentment was more than he’d hoped for when he was on house arrest with Lucinda.

But as is the case with life, the minute that Jack accepts that this _is_ his life and hunkers down for the long road ahead…that’s when it all gets blown apart.


	8. We are shining

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from "Spectrum" by Florence + the Machine

Jack licks his lips and drops elegantly onto his knees, never breaking eye contact with the man, who smiles in anticipation. He unzips the man’s pants, fishing inside to pull his half-hard cock free. Heat pools in his groin immediately at the sight and feel of it. He hasn’t been this close to another man’s cock in weeks, too busy playing diplomat on a trip to eastern Austeria with Ezra.

Because of the weeks-long celibacy, he decided to let himself indulge tonight. He’d foregone Robert and Frank and instead gone to Listeria, a high-end club in downtown Bozrah, one of his regular hangouts. A place where drinks cost double what they should, the tables are glass cubes and the chairs are adorably uncomfortable, all under a haze of cerulean-lit walls.

He’d ordered a pink drink at the bar, not because he wanted it, but because he wanted the cute boy to notice, the one who had been eying him since he’d come in. He’d swiveled in his seat, caught the boy’s eye and taken a sip, raising his eyebrow and smirking. The boy looked to be early twenties, fresh and innocent and just a little bit terrified of the look on Jack’s face. But he’d been brave enough to approach him a couple minutes later. So Jack decided to reward him, slipping a load of cash to the bartender for the use of the small VIP room in the back.

Now, Jack’s licking the man’s cock from base to tip slowly, never letting his eyes fall from the other man’s. He perfected this, the art of the blowjob, when he was nineteen and he’d had Eli to practice on every night. He’d learned that blowjobs were only half technique, the other half was the performance. He licks it a few more times, teasingly, as the man breathes harder. And he never looks away, not even as he finally sinks down onto it completely, opening his throat until his nose is buried in pubic hair.

He earns an “Oh God” and a hand wrapped in his hair for his efforts. He pulls back and smiles, just for a second before sliding back down, finally breaking eye contact as his eyelids flutter shut and he groans around the cock. The man is obviously fully hard now, hips stuttering as he fists Jack’s hair and tries to take control over the situation.

Jack pulls back and smirks, “You want to fuck my mouth?”

The man nods his head enthusiastically and gasps, “Yes.”

“Well, you don’t get to.” Jack waits until the man’s brow starts to furrow before continuing, “You aren’t in control here, you got that?”

The man’s cock twitches slightly under Jack’s hand. He obviously isn’t used to being told what to do by the man on his knees, and yet he loves it.

Fifty-percent performance.

“So get your fucking hands out of my hair until I tell you that you can touch me.” Jack’s voice is quiet but hard, offering no room for argument. The man immediately lets go of Jack. “Now place them palms back on the wall behind you.”

He complies immediately, but it isn’t enough.

“And say ‘yes, sir,’” Jack commands.

“Yes, sir.”

Jack smiles and slides back down the man’s cock, hollowing his cheeks and swirling his tongue. He gets lost in it, the taste of pre-cum and the frenetic groans of his partner. He feels a hand lace through his hair and slides his teeth, just a little too hard, across the man’s length.

The man cries out in pain.

“I said, ‘don’t touch me until I tell you to,’” Jack mutters. “Are you fucking stupid?”

“I’m sorry,” the man gasps, instantly placing his hand back on the wall. “I wasn’t even thinking. You’re just so fucking beautiful. Please.”

Jack raises an eyebrow and smirks, but he doesn’t make a move to continue, just gazes up at the man through lidded eyes. He knows exactly what he looks like right now, lips parted and reddened, panting slightly. This poor bastard had no idea what he was getting himself into when he slid next to Jack at the bar and started to flirt. He’d been horrible at flirting, but he was cute…and a bit of an idiot since he didn’t seem to know who Jack was.

“Please…sir,” the man repeats, and Jack responds by sucking him in earnest, no lazy pulls, no pausing for tongue work on the head, just bobbing up and down, reaching into the man’s boxers to cup his balls. No more performance, just a dirty, hard, fast blowjob. The man cries out and starts to shake. In his peripheral vision, Jack sees the man’s hand snaking toward his hair again, but the man remembers and stops before he touches Jack. He places his hand back on the wall and makes a fist.

 _Perfect,_ Jack thinks, smiling and pulling away again. The man groans at the sudden loss of Jack’s mouth. He looks blissful as he smiles down at Jack, like there is nothing else in the world except him, because in this moment there isn’t. A bomb could go off next door and this man wouldn’t notice. He’s ready.

Jack lets go of the cock and puts his hands behind his back. He licks his lips again, trying for seduction this time and asks, “Do you want to fuck my mouth?”

The man hesitates for a second, thinking this is part of the game and unsure what to answer. Eventually he just nods, eyes wide with longing.

“Then do it,” Jack replies, wrapping his mouth around the tip of the man’s cock and holding it there, relinquishing control. His own cock is straining against his pants, but he resists the urge to rub it. It is always better to let the need build until it is a roaring fire inside his whole body, too massive to be ignored. Only then will he touch himself.

The man grabs the back of his head and shoves his cock all of the way down Jack’s throat. Jack groans and closes his eyes, forgetting everything else in the world except this, the feel of another man, hard and heavy against his tongue.

Through the haze of desire he still manages to hear the door to the backroom squeak open. Didn’t the asshole whose cock is currently down Jack’s throat remember to lock the fucking door?

Jack pulls back and gazes up at the door, prepared to tell the intruder to ‘fuck off.’ Instead he stops breathing and his dick instantly softens.

David fucking Shepherd. Beautiful, noble David Shepherd, with his perfect blond hair is staring at him with eyes like saucers. Jack just stares back, still not breathing. It’s as if time has stopped and he has no idea how many seconds tick by with the two of them simply staring at one another.

The man finally breaks the spell when he snaps at David, “Do you mind?”

The world restarts. Jack begins breathing again. David’s brows pull down and he starts to back up. The man’s fingers tighten slightly around Jack’s hair, and Jack wants nothing more than to punch the living shit out of the man for using that bitchy voice on David Shepherd.

“Sorry,” David manages to say while backing out of the door and closing it.

“What a dick,” the man mutters and Jack pushes his hand off, standing up hurriedly.

“Fuck off,” Jack says, smoothing down his hair and turning for the door.

“Wait,” the man is frantic as Jack pulls the door open. Jack looks back to see him standing there, arm outstretched, panicked, erect dick still sticking out of his jeans, “You can’t leave like this. That was the best fucking—“

“Yeah,” Jack says, a bit rushed because he needs to find David before he disappears. “Best fucking blowjob you’ve ever gotten. I’ve heard it before. You’ll get over it.”

He pulls the door shut behind him and pushes through the dancing crowd. He spots David’s blond hair heading out the front door and charges after him, not caring when he pushes both men and women out of the way.

David’s almost to his blue Volvo parked outside when Jack finally makes it out of the club door.

“David, wait,” Jack yells, tripping slightly on his own feet, shivering in the early March air.

David is the height of uncomfortable and embarrassed when he turns around. He won’t even look at Jack. A black hole opens inside Jack as he realizes…David knows. David has finally seen Jack for the perverted pit of wrong that he is and he is going to tell Jack to never speak to him again. Jack can’t find words. He wants to beg David to please not give up on him like everyone else has, but he also wants to yell at David for judging him, for being just like everybody else. He doesn’t know what to say.

“Jack,” David says, rushed and awkward, still looking anywhere but at Jack, “I am so sorry. I had no idea. I didn’t mean to interrupt. If I’d known…God, I’m so sorry.”

This is not the reaction Jack is expecting, so he just gapes, unable to say anything in return. David keeps babbling.

“Ezra said that you went clubbing and I haven’t seen you in weeks. So, I thought I’d come out and surprise you. I figured you’d be here or at Gypsy Bar. I wanted to join you, I mean, not _join_ you …but, uh…The bartender told me you were in the VIP room, but he didn’t say that you were with someone…”

Jack feels like he should say something, help David out of this embarrassment loop, but he is still so confused by his reaction. Judgment he can handle, but this, he doesn’t know what this is.

“If he’d told me you were with a girl…or even a guy, I guess…I wouldn’t have come back there, but…I’m sorry, you had all of those girls in Shiloh. I didn’t know that you liked guys too…or maybe _just_ guys?”

He finally takes a breath and looks straight at Jack and says more slowly, more in control of his voice, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt. You didn’t have to follow me out here. You can go back to, you know, what you were doing.”

“I can go back to what I was doing?”

“Yeah.”

“I can go back to sucking a stranger’s dick in the backroom of a club?” Jack’s voice is hollow, no feeling, because he still doesn’t know what he feels.

“Well, yeah. I’m just saying, ‘I’m sorry I interrupted.’”

“No ‘why are you such a slut, Jack?’” Jack asks.

“What?”

“No ‘how can you treat your body like that, Jack? Your body is a temple, a gift from God, not something that you debauch like a pervert’?”

“Why would I say those things?”

“Because you’re David Shepherd.”

“You think I’m an asshole?” David’s embarrassment is completely gone, replaced by…anger. Jack still has no idea what is going on, but that is always the case with David. He seems so transparent and easy to understand, until the moments when Jack realizes he doesn’t understand him at all. Like now.

“I think you’re a holier-than-thou prude.”

“Really?” David’s face contorts with honest-to-God rage. “After everything we’ve been…after  _everything_. You can _still_ say that to me? Fuck you, Jack. _Fuck you_.”

He turns and gets into the driver’s seat of his car. Jack suddenly thinks that maybe  _he_  completely fucked up this entire situation. He lunges after David, grabbing to car door before David can close it.

“Wait, I…” The words bleed out of his head and there is nothing. He has no idea what to say because this is not how a person should react to finding Jack Benjamin, former crown prince of Gilboa, on his knees getting fucked in the mouth by a stranger in the back of a club.

A person should to be disgusted.

“Fuck off,” David says and pulls the door closed.

Jack stares down the street long after the car disappears.

* * *

After eight days of enduring David’s avoidance, Jack is frustrated beyond reason. And he still can’t determine exactly why David is upset. Was it seeing Jack on his knees like a common whore? Is it learning that Jack likes to fuck men? Or is it because Jack called him a “holier-than-thou prude”? Because he is one, but Jack probably shouldn’t have passed judgment. After all, he knows exactly how it feels to be judged for one’s sexual experiences, or _lack_ of sexual experiences in David’s case…except that one time with Michelle.

Two virgins going at it. That must have been hilariously awkward.

The night before Jack is to leave on a diplomatic journey to Moab, he corners David in the kitchen. It’s already late, almost midnight and the moonlight streaming through the window gives everything an ethereal quality. It emboldens Jack, like this isn’t quite reality, like he is already asleep and this is a dream, so he can say things to David that he normally wouldn’t.

“Are you ever going to forgive me for…liking men?”

David is sitting at the kitchen table nursing a glass of port, staring at it, presumably deep in thought. He glances up sharply at the accusation.

“What?”

“I said—“

“I heard what you said.” David’s irritated, very irritated. Good.

“So, are you?”

“You still think I’m mad because you’re gay?”

Jack simply tilts his head and raises his eyebrows in response. It still seems odd to hear it stated like that, _you’re gay._ Jack doesn’t tend to use those words when he thinks of himself. It seems too simple, too innocuous, for the years of confusion and turmoil that it’s caused.

“You are such…God, you are such an asshole.”

David Shepherd saying the Lord’s name in vain? It still gives Jack a tingly, happy feeling inside every time it happens, like he's corrupting him. When Jack doesn’t respond, David sighs and continues.

“Fine, Jack, let’s do this. Let’s have this damn conversation already.”

“Let’s.”

“So, you’re gay, huh?”

“I like men. Yeah.”

“Just men?”

“Yes.”

“Congratulations.” David can barely hide the sarcasm in his tone. “Good for you. What do you want me to say?”

“I want you to tell me why you’ve been avoiding me.”

“You know why I’m mad at you.”

“You know, you have no right to get all self-righteous about this. Everyone doesn’t have to be like you, Shepherd. Sex doesn’t always have to be about love.”

“That, right there,” David says pointing his finger at Jack. “ _That_ is why I’m mad at you. You think I’m a judgmental asshole. What have I ever done that would make you think that?”

“Come on. You’ve always known that I party, that I hook up with random people, but it was only when you realized that I was hooking up with men that I saw that disgust in your eyes.”

“Disgust? What the hell are you talking about?”

“You practically fell over your own feet running out of that club after what you saw.”

“That wasn’t disgust.” David is so frustrated he’s practically yelling. “I assumed that you didn't want an audience, but if was wrong about that, I apologize. I _gladly_ would have sat down and watched.”

“Oh, that’s funny.” Jack smiles, but there is no joy in it. “Pure, perfect David Shepherd watching a guy give another guy a blowjob in the back of a club.”

“Yeah, well, maybe you don’t know me as well as you think you do.”

“Trust me, the minute I met you, I had you pegged. I’ve met your type before.”

“Fucking hell. Why are you being such a dick about this? Is it really that hard to just say ‘I’m sorry I called you a judgmental ass?’ Because I’m not and you know that.”

“Fine, you’re right. I’m sorry.” David has dragged the words out of him, but Jack has always been horrible at apologies, so he can’t leave it at that. “If you want to be vanilla and never have any sex, that’s fine. It’s not my place to judge, so I’m sorry.”

“Wow,” David smirks. “You _almost_ made it through a real apology without screwing it up. I’m impressed. But, just this once, since I stupidly didn’t know that you were gay, I’ll give you a pass for thinking I’m _vanilla_.”

“You’re not?” Jack says it like a joke, but with an edge of candor.

“Just because I prefer to have sex with people I care about, doesn’t make it vanilla.”

“Strong words from a virgin. Sorry, I forgot about that one time, of course.” Jack’s smiling, obviously trying to taunt David. The fight has slipped into something playful and friendly, and now Jack is just trying to piss him off because he looks so adorable, eyes wide, lips pursed and fists balled on the kitchen table.

It reminds him of that first night at the club when David tried to act like he wasn’t a saint. It was one of the first times that Jack thought of him as anything except an annoying nuisance. Decked out in jeans and that navy jacket, smiling and carefree, he’d actually looked cute.

“I’ve had sex with more than one woman, you asshole,” David replies, but he’s smiling also. He sees that they’ve slipped into jovial mockery. “Plus, I’ve made out with a few guys, too.”

Time stops. Jack’s heart is suddenly racing. The clock on the wall seems to be ticking too loudly. He can’t take his eyes off of David’s even for a second, even to blink. David waits, his expression guarded.

An image snaps into Jack’s mind of David kissing a man, pushing him against the wall, hands laced behind his head. He’s made out with guys? David fucking Shepherd has made out with guys? When? What did they look like? Does he have a type and if so, what’s his type? Is Jack his type?

Would David really have sat down and watched Jack give that man a blowjob? Had he liked what he saw? Was he into that kind of thing?

Jack can feel the blood rushing to his groin.

“So, you’re what?” Jack replies, voice dry and scratchy. “A two-beer queer?”

“No,” David replies immediately, not bothering to expand.

“It’s okay. I’ve made out with plenty of drunk ‘straight’ boys.”

David steps back and leans against the kitchen table, taking a long sip of port before continuing, “I’ve never understood everyone else’s obsession with one gender, like they only like people who have certain body parts. It is almost like _who_ the person is on the inside, the soul, is a secondary concern. I’ve never understood that.”

“Are you saying that you’re above physical attraction, because it’s kind of a universal human trait?”

“No, I’ve been attracted to plenty of men and women.”

“Men _and_ women? For real?” Jack doesn’t mean for it to sound judgmental but it is so foreign to him that he can’t fully understand. Jack has kissed women, and he’s even fucked a few since it seemed necessary to maintain the façade, but he didn’t enjoy it. It was a struggle to stay aroused. He had to think about men in order to perform.

“My whole life I have seen everyone putting themselves into these two little boxes, perfectly labeled. And I always thought something was wrong with me, because I’d find an amazing girl and think ‘I’m straight,’ but then four months later, I would be head over heels for a boy and think ‘No, I guess I’m gay.’ It took years for me to realize that I just didn’t fit, that I wasn’t like everyone else. That I like both.”

“But, you’ve never had sex with a man, right? You’ve just _kissed_ boys. I’ve kissed plenty of girls, and it doesn’t have to mean anything.”

David’s face contorts in frustration. “I thought you’d understand, but I guess not.”

Jack has certainly encountered bisexuals before, but he’d always assumed that they were just gay people who hadn’t fully committed to it yet. He passed through that phase too, when he told himself he was bi and he just hadn’t met the right woman yet. But, it’s David, so he wants to understand.

“So, why haven’t you gone all of the way with a guy?” Jack’s voice has lost the edge of incredulity. He’s just curious and David sags against the table, at ease and no longer on the defensive.

David pauses, contemplating while he takes another sip of port. He hands it to Jack who drinks, slightly amazed that he could know David so well and yet still not know him at all.

“I don’t know,” David replies. “I guess it’s just easier to approach women, and there are certainly more straight women than gay men to choose from.”

It still seems so weird, liking both equally. Jack wonders if David really doesn’t have a preference, one gender that he finds more attractive. He wonders if David goes for the same qualities in guys and girls, or does he like his women sweet and his men snarky, his women soft and curvaceous and his men hard and toned.

“Plus,” David’s voice gets low and husky, “I have this problem in which I always fall for the exact guy I shouldn’t fall for.”

David smiles sadly and looks up, staring into Jack’s eyes with an unfathomable expression. Jack’s breath hitches and his stomach drops. It’s a look he’s seen before, from men at bars when they want to be the ones who go home with Jack. But from David, it means so much more and it’s terrifying.

They hold there like stars in the night, hot and glowing with a vast void between them. It is only three feet, but neither seems capable of closing the distance. Jack tells his body to move, but it doesn’t. He’s frozen with fear and as many times as he’s thought of kissing David, now that he should, he can’t. This isn’t some anonymous boy in a club. This is David Shepherd, beautiful and flawed, strong and vulnerable…and entirely too good for Jack.

The moment drags on until it’s lost, slipping into the void. David downs the rest of the port, sets the glass on the table and touches Jack lightly on the shoulder.

“Goodnight,” he whispers, and heads down the hallway.


	9. Melic in the naked

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from "Michicant" by Bon Iver

Jack has been rolling in bed for almost an hour, thinking about his conversation with David earlier that evening, how he stood there like an imbecile when David basically admitted to having feelings for him. It’s past 1:00 am and he is about to give up and get out of bed when there is a soft knock on his door, he knows exactly who it is and instantly feels a bit flushed. He doesn’t move or make any noise and there is another quiet knock. He is terrified, of _what_ he isn’t sure.

He pads toward the door, turns the lock and wrenches the door open so quickly that David’s eyes widen. He was going for bravery and resolve ripping the door open like that, but now he realizes he just seems angry.

Which he isn’t, except at himself for acting like a teenager.

“Sorry, I didn’t—“

“I was awake,” Jack doesn’t mean to sound snappy, but adrenaline is coursing through his veins. Anticipation and joy and fear all mixing together.

Jack is dressed in just a t-shirt and boxers, but he honestly forgets until David’s eye drift down his body, making David’s cheeks grow rosy. David looks slightly more respectable in a white t-shirt and jeans, but his feet are bare like he simply rolled out of bed and slid on his pants before walking down the hallway to Jack’s room.

“As you know I tend to take people at face value,” David says, looking back up into Jack’s eyes, obviously nervous but resolved to get these words out, “And with all of your girls and your reputation, I just assumed. But I’m not stupid and there were moments when I thought there might be something here,” David waves his hand, “between us. Moments when you’d look at me and I’d think you wanted me to kiss you. I told myself I was just imagining it. I tried to convince myself that you were straight, because even if you liked men, I knew that I shouldn’t pursue you because of…”

 _Michelle_. Jack can feel the word on David’s tongue, but he’s grateful that he doesn’t say it. Spoken aloud, her name might evoke all of the consequences and end this before it even begins.

“But this past week, I’ve just been thinking about all of those moments, trying to figure out if I was imagining this thing between us…”

David is doing that adorable babbling thing again, and Jack wants to grab his t-shirt and drag him into the room. He would if it were anyone besides David. Even Joseph, he would have taken control and not been filled with this ridiculous fear. But he is nervous, so he replies with a simply, “Yeah?”

And then mentally kicks himself.

David sighs, closes his eyes and when he opens them Jack sees all of the courage and hope that originally drew him to David, but it is directed at him, just him. “I know just because you like _guys_ , doesn’t mean you like _me_ , but I need to ask…because you’re leaving tomorrow morning and if I don’t ask now…”

David’s courage starts to shatter in the face of Jack’s silence. David Shepherd, who took on a Goliath…twice, who faced the firing squad without tears, is afraid of Jack Benjamin rejecting him?

Before he can think about his actions or their consequences, Jack steps forward, laces his hand behind David’s neck and presses their lips together. He tastes sweet like port, intoxicating, and Jack dives in, dragging David’s body toward his and deepening the kiss.

Every time Jack thought of David as naïve and prudish and inexperienced – he’s cursing those thoughts now, totally unprepared for the skillful way David thrusts his tongue into Jack’s mouth, pushes him into the room and against the wall. He takes control and claims Jack as his own. Jack moans and simply lets him because he’s always been in control with all of the other boys. He’s always insisted upon it, even when he was being taken, being pounded into the bed, he was in control because he was a prince. They were beneath him and they knew it.

But David, the country boy who is destined to be king, he kisses Jack just like he does everything else, with complete conviction and purpose, demanding submission without being dominating. It makes Jack’s knees weak, the unerring focus with which David kisses him. It makes him feel like the brightest star in David’s sky.

He cups the curve of David’s ass and grinds forward, feeling David grow hard against him. It breaks David’s focus and he pulls his lips away from Jack to gasp, as he buries his face in the crook of Jack’s neck.

“Hell,” he mutters, and Jack manages to close the door and lock it while maintaining the rhythm, grinding against David. He walks David back toward the bed, kissing him until he feels light-headed from lack of oxygen. Not that he’s complaining, because David’s mouth would be the most wonderful way to die. David’s knees hit the bed and Jack pushes him lightly until he’s sitting, legs splayed open with Jack standing between them.

Jack can’t seem to stop kissing him, not even to pull his t-shirt over his head. He grabs the base of it, pulling it up and snaking his hand across the hard planes of David’s muscles, but he doesn’t take it off because he’s too lost in David’s mouth. He feels like he’s found the Garden of Eden and if he pulls away even for a second, he’ll lose it forever, cast out by God for not appreciating this beautiful gift.

Thankfully, David is stronger because he breaks the kiss, despite Jack’s protests, and quickly rids them both of their t-shirts. Then, Jack is lost anew, but in the curves and planes of David’s chest, the adorable tuft of blond hair just below his belly button.

“You’re beautiful,” Jack murmurs without even thinking about how stupid and sentimental he sounds.

David smiles and nods his head slightly as he slides back onto the bed, “Come here.”

His voice is rough and low, making desire pool in Jack as he does what he’s told, yet again relinquishing control to David. He climbs onto the bed and straddles David, running his hands over every exposed piece of flesh, memorizing the heat of it, the feel of it, lightly tracing the scars from David’s life as a soldier.

In the brief pause, after the initial wave of desire, Jack is able to form a coherent thought and realizes he’s kissing a man who might as well be a virgin; he hasn’t been with a man. They need to slow down.

David meets his eyes and runs the tips of his fingers up Jack’s waist, lazily and lovingly, whispering, “You’re beautiful too.”

Jack smiles in spite of himself. It is so fucking cheesy and he wants David to say it again and again.

“I don’t want to push you,” Jack says.

“You’re not.”

“I know, but you’ve never done this with a man, so I just want you to know we can stop at any moment. You just have to tell me to stop.”

“And you’ve never done this with _me_ ,” David replies, “so, you can stop it too, Jack.”

“I know,” Jack chuckles, “but I’m not going to.”

David’s legs tighten around Jack and faster than a pouncing cat, he rolls Jack so he’s on top, pressing his hardening dick into Jack’s groin and brushing his fingers along Jack’s shoulder.

“Neither am I,” David murmurs and bends to devour his mouth. Heat blossoms in Jack and he’s grinding against David, frantic and whimpering with need. He hasn’t acted this pathetic with a guy since he was nineteen but he can’t make himself calm down.

David’s mouth cuts a path from Jack’s lips, across his jawline and onto his neck, where he sucks and bites, sure to leave marks while Jack kneads the hard curve of David’s ass and grinds against him, wordlessly begging David to ride him.

Jack wants to feel every inch of David’s body, know it, memorize it and he wants David to claim him in return, mark him for all of the world to see. It’s a luxury he’s never had with any boy in the past and yet he can’t remember even wanting it until now. He was the one who marked his claim, who owned them; they had no claim over him. Not even Joseph. He’d still fucked other boys when he was dating Joseph. He knew it hurt Joseph so he didn’t flaunt his infidelity, but he’d never even considered dropping the other men.

David kisses a hot path down his body and Jack feels on fire. David’s actually quite adept at removing clothing and in no time they are naked, skin to skin, David’s hand wrapping around Jack’s cock and tugging it experimentally. Jack can tell that David’s never gone this far with a man, by the way he stares at Jack’s cock, hard and throbbing, between his fingers.

“Holy God,” David whispers.

“Best not to bring God into this, I’ve heard He doesn’t approve,” Jack replies, but there is no bitterness behind his words. He’s too filled with joy to be bitter right now.

David glances at him, looking slightly wounded, but mostly aroused. “You’re wrong. He sent you to me, knowing this would happen. He wants this.”

“Tell yourself that if it makes you feel better, but don’t stop,” Jacks groans wickedly as David swipes his thumb along the slit.

He works Jack like a pro, not like a man who has never touched another cock besides his own, but that seems to be the way with David Shepherd: everything comes naturally to him. After a few minutes, Jack stops him with a light touch. “My turn.”

He pushes David back until he’s lying on the pillows, kissing him briefly before gliding down David’s body, placing feather light kisses on his chest, his abs, the hollow where his leg meets his groin. David’s cock twitches when Jack lightly grabs the base. Jack looks up through his lashes, the seductive “I’m about to blow you” look he’s given so many times before and finds David staring with so much intensity it stops Jack’s breath. He tilts his head and looks David straight in the eye.

“I told you I won’t stop this, _you_ have to.” Jack has never said something this stupid with his lips an inch away from another man’s cock. That isn’t part of the “performance” he perfected years ago, but it’s David and he looks so fierce and filled with…oh God, it looks like _love_ …that Jack’s carefully choreographed seduction stutters and falls apart.

“I’m not stopping you.”

Jack wraps his lips around David’s cock, which is perfect _of course_ , thick and long but not too thick or too long, and beautifully straight…and circumsized, unlike most boys.

David’s right hand wraps around Jack’s head, and instead of being annoyed or telling him to stop, Jack groans and doubles his efforts, taking all of David into his mouth, until he’s bucking and moaning Jack’s name. Nothing has ever sounded so sweet.

It’s hard to stop, but Jack does, because he has no idea how long it’s been for David and he can’t have him coming already. He looks up to see David staring back, eyes lidded, mouth parted and chest heaving. David Shepherd, falling apart underneath him is the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen. So beautiful that Jack forgets all of his rules, the one’s designed to keep his heart safe and unbroken and before he even realizes it he’s whispering, “I want you.”

David smiles lopsidedly. “I want you too.”

“No, I mean I want you…inside of me.”

“Oh.” David’s eyes are wide with an obvious mixture of longing and fear, “You mean?”

Jack nods. David hesitates and Jack instantly regrets it. He’s pushed too hard. David hasn’t done more than kiss a guy and he’s asking him to fuck him. He sits up and starts to backpedal.

“Nevermind,” Jack says. “We should slow down.”

David leans toward him, grabbing his shoulder so he can’t escape.

“I want you,” David says with complete conviction. “Any and every way you’ll have me. I’m not disgusted. I just didn’t expect it, but I’ve thought about it, a lot.”

“Seriously, we should slow down. I don’t want to do anything you’ll regret.”

“Or anything you’ll regret,” David replies immediately.

“I only regret that I wasn’t doing this with you before,” Jack replies in a pathetic moment of honesty.

“What do I do?” David asks, and Jack smiles, hopping off the bed to retrieve the lube from his dresser. He lies back on the pillows and squirts a dollop of lube on his right hand.

“Sit right there.” He gestures for David to sit in front of him so they are facing each other. He pulls his legs up and apart to make room. “And pay attention.”

Jack slides a finger in, watching David the entire time, searching for the look of disgust he’s seen from other boys who were not as gay as they claimed to be. David just looks intrigued and excited. Jack moans and slides two fingers in, hooking them so they hit the right spot and desire radiates outward into his whole body. He closes his eyes and drops his head onto the pillows, lost in the pleasure, trying to open himself as quickly as possible.

His eyes fly open when he feels David grab the base of his cock with one hand while the other pulls Jack’s fingers out. He’s about to protest, but then David’s fingers are sliding into him and he completely loses his ability to think. He can’t tear his gaze away from those beautiful, calloused fingers sliding in and out of him, perfectly mimicking the movements that Jack had been doing, while his other hand pumps Jack’s cock with the same slow rhythm.

“Three,” he groans, and thankfully David understands, pushing three fingers in and it burns in a beautiful way. He lightly grabs David’s hand, turning it slightly and telling him to curl his fingers. David looks confused but he does as he’s told and manages to hit Jack’s spot.

Jack’s body arches and he falls back onto the bed, pumping against David’s fingers and fisting the blankets.

“Fuck,” David mutters and for some reason Jack starts to laugh.

“What?” David says, as his fingers slow and stop.

“Nothing,” Jack’s still smiling and blissful. “I just love when you swear.”

“Think you’re corrupting me?” David’s smiling too, and Jack knows that he is referring to the sex and not the swearing.

Jack grabs him, pulling him forward and squirting some lube on his dick and says, “I know I am.”

David studies Jack for a second, lightly running the tips of his fingers along the sensitive flesh of his inner thighs, making Jack shudder and moan. Then David pushes himself into Jack slowly, falling apart as he does, eyes closing, mouth opening, head tilting back. Jack’s been with a few “virgins” before, plus he knows personally how different this feels compared to a woman, how much tighter and hotter it is. He can see it all play out on David’s face, the realization and the joy. David doesn’t open his eyes until he’s fully seated inside Jack, but when he is, he stops and gazes down at him, eyes lidded with desire.

David dances his fingers up Jack’s sides and then leans down to brush his lips against Jack’s mouth. It is so intimate that Jack tenses slightly. None of the other guys ever kissed Jack while they were inside of him. Jack never allowed it, but it seems there is nothing he won’t give to David.

David pulls back and looks at him, eyes blown and blissed out. “You’re amazing.”

Jack furrows his brow. _Hot, beautiful, sexy,_ those words are familiar in this situation, but amazing isn’t simply about his appearance.

“Just move,” Jack says, thrusting his hips slightly. It’s too overwhelming, David inside of him, kissing him and mooning over him.

And David moves, perfectly. Jack pulls his legs up and David’s cock hits that spot inside and he’s lost, completely lost, head thrown back, gasping and muttering _yes_ and _fuck_ and _David_ , _right there._

David is silent apart from panting. He’s focused on Jack’s reactions, noticing when a thrust causes Jack to shake and arch and then trying to duplicate that thrust. Jack’s body feels lit up, tingly and on fire. He grabs himself, pumping along with David’s thrusts.

Of course, David pushes Jack’s hand away, grabbing Jack’s cock while he thrusts into him, trying and struggling to find a rhythm.

“Your first time,” Jack says, trying to take control over his own cock again, “David, you don’t have to do everything.”

“Shut up,” he says, slightly annoyed, because he is David and he does have to do everything, be perfect at everything. David’s annoyance seems to ground him and he finds the rhythm, pumping Jack in time with his thrusts.

 _Holy fuck._ Jack’s head is ringing and his body is singing and he can feel it building in his balls, feel himself tightening around David’s cock and then the world is shattering and spinning and he’s crying out, maybe David’s name, maybe just a groan.

After he comes down from the high, he notices that David isn’t moving anymore but his cock is still buried inside Jack.

“Did you come?” Jack asks, because even though that’s how the fantasies play out, people rarely come at the same time.

“No.”

“Then, what are you doing?”

“Well, you came, so I stopped.”

“David, just move. Fuck me.”

David thrusts, never breaking eye contact. Without having to jerk Jack off, he can focus on this. He grasps Jack’s hips, pulling them up so he can thrust faster and deeper. It doesn’t take David long, which isn’t a surprise. Jack watches intently, trying to memorize ever shudder, the way his eyelids drop down and his mouth drops open, as David releases inside of him.

He falls onto Jack immediately after, panting and sweaty and still inside Jack, seemingly forgetting that Jack’s come is all over his belly.

“Wait, David,” Jack says, pushing him off. “You got…stuff…all over you.”

David pulls out, getting more lube and come on the covers.

“Who cares,” David says lazily, rolling off of Jack and onto his back. “How could I care about anything after that?”

Jack smiles, remembering that feeling when sex was completely new. He gets up, cleans himself up in the bathroom and then wets a towel, returning to find David looking overly pleased with himself.

Jack sits beside him and gently dabs at his cock and stomach with the towel.

“Jack Benjamin cleaning me. I never thought I’d see that.”

Jack throws that towel at him. “Then do it yourself.”

“But you do it so much better.”

“I’m not your servant,” Jack can hear how clipped his own voice is, annoyed. He knows why. It isn’t the towel. It is the hangover that comes after the high, from realizing that he opened himself to someone, and pain is all that ever comes of that.

David takes the towel and finishes cleaning himself. “I didn’t say you were. Now come here.”

Jack sits back, just out of reach. “Why?”

“Because I want to kiss you.”

“No.”

“No?” David sits up, the laziness and happiness gone. He studies Jack. He must see the way that Jack is retreating into himself. There is a moment when it looks like David might say something snarky or simply leave.

 _Good,_ Jack thinks, _I don’t need you here acting like the world is so beautiful and everything is perfect because you finally got to fuck a man in the ass._

David purses his lips and his eyes soften. He leans onto his side, propping his head on his hand, “Do you know when I first knew I wanted you?”

Jack is well aware of what David is doing. it’s a common enough interrogation technique. A non sequitur, a J-turn, used to regain control of a situation through unbalancing the opponent, so Jack doesn’t react. Of course, that doesn’t stop David.

“We were on a mission in Gath.” David smiles faintly at the memory and Jack is intrigued despite himself. “You were being a complete dick. I’d offered my opinion about something, and you got all up in my face, and said,” David mimics Jack’s clipped tone, “’I am your commanding officer, better than king, are we clear?’ You were so close and being such a dick and I just wanted to kiss you.”

David is smiling broadly now, lost in the memory. Jack’s chest feels like it’s caving in; he can’t catch his breath. That was over a year ago. That was _before_ the night that the lights went out and David wound up in bed with Michelle.

If David notices Jack’s uneasiness, he doesn’t let on. “I guess I should have just kissed you, except there were other men around.”

“And I found you pretty annoying at that point,” Jack whispers, the words dragged out of him by the shear force of David’s charisma, by his ability to diffuse Jack’s discomfort by opening his heart without demanding that Jack open his in return. Despite all of the war and betrayal and politics he’s endured, David is still so open and giving. A part of Jack would love to be like that, but he’s lost it. His parents and uncle beat it out of him before he’d even realized it was gone, so he knows it’s gone forever.

“Jack.” David’s tone is playful and he’s smiling and still naked and ridiculously gorgeous. “You _still_ find me pretty annoying.”

And just like that, David has done it. Jack is chuckling. The moment when he normally would have emotionally retreated and kicked the boy out of his room, it’s gone.

David hops out of bed, but he doesn’t go to Jack, doesn’t touch him. He simply puts his boxers back on and then inspects the lube stains on the blanket. Jack still feels slightly on edge, emotions raw and exposed. Fragile. He’s certain that the moment could shatter all over again if David did anything sentimental, like professed his undying love or told him how beautiful he is.

“You’re right, it’s messy,” David says, smiling. “Get up, I need to strip off this top blanket.”

Jack does, watching as David removes the blanket to expose the sheets underneath. He throws the blanket on the floor and then rummages around Jack’s closet for another one, which he throws on top of the bed. He goes to each side to smooth it down, not asking for Jack’s help even though he’s standing right there. Jack dons his boxers and watches, still slightly detached from everything.

David pats down the blanket on the other side of the bed and then looks at Jack. “There. Just like new.”

Neither of them move or speak. Jack knows that David wants to stay the night. They always want to, but this is one of the few times Jack wants it too, and it’s terrifying. David is way too good for him and he’s bound to realize that someday. Why is he even here? How did this even happen?

Jack had wanted to drag David’s bright and shining soul into the darkness of his own, but he sees now that it is the other way around. David is dragging Jack out of the abyss, showering him with his warmth and love. It’s fucking intoxicating. Jack could easily become addicted to it, might already be, but he knows where this sort of love leads. Eventually the bright soul realizes that it has taken up with darkness and it moves on to find another soul worthy of it.

There is no future in which this won’t end badly. Very very badly.

“I’ll leave if you want,” David mutters. “I’ll understand.”

The rational part of Jack’s mind screams _Yes, leave_ at the exact same moment that his lips part and he whispers, “Stay.”


	10. You can only chase a butterfly for so long

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from "Prince Across the Water" by Jane Yolen.
> 
> Also, recall that the Philistines (in this story) are the residents of the former nation, Philistia, which was broken into three nations (Ekron, Ashdod and Ashkelon) after a great war (in this story Ekron is the most important of these nations, the one to remember). The Philistines border Gath on its west and north sides. Moab is just north of Austeria.

Jack should have guessed that David is a fan of cheesy text messages, and he’s ashamed to admit how much he looks forward to waking up to one each morning. This morning’s text is _Should get up but I’m lying in bed thinking about the color of your eyes._

Jack: _They’re blue. Get up._

David: _I know they’re blue, I was thinking about the shade. Blue-grey…like the ocean before a storm._

Jack: _Leave the poetry to Keats and get up._

Jack always replies with snark even as he’s smiling ear-to-ear like an imbecile. After this morning’s text, he studies his eyes in the mirror. David is right; they are slightly grey. He can’t believe that David noticed.

He’s been in Moab for 20 days or an eternity, he isn’t sure which. His life is schmoozing and drinking and playing the game of politics that he was taught to play since infancy. He’s at a ball at the President’s mansion, talking to an old pockmarked senator, trying not to scream in boredom, when he feels a light tap on his shoulder.

Mid-sentence he turns to find Princess Abigail of Ammon smiling at him. She was always beautiful, but she’s grown into that beauty since Jack last saw her. Dark, almost iridescent hair, olive skin, almond-shaped eyes with irises that are almost as black as the pupils they surround.

“Prince Jack, I see you’ve grown only slightly better at hiding your boredom.”

The aged senator lets out a sharp breath of annoyance, but Jack apologizes to him and drags Abigail away for some privacy.

Jack first met her when he was eighteen and she was sixteen, at a similar ball in Shiloh. King Silas had been hosting the King of Ammon and his three children and Jack had instantly taken a liking to the youngest princess, Abigail. She was irreverent and had a sharp tongue, plus she was beautiful and royalty. Jack knew that she was the perfect match for him, both in personality and pedigree. She would make a wonderful Queen of Gilboa someday and so he’d made it his goal that weekend to fall desperately in love with her.

She was the last girl he’d ever tried to like.

“I see your father is still a complete dick,” Abigail says once they are alone and Jack laughs.

“Yeah, well, he’s not really my father anymore, technically.”

“I saw that,” she replies. “He disowned you, you lucky asshole. If I were you, I’d never look back. You’re free.”

As royalty, she understands Jack’s life in a way that very few people do, the immensity of expectations that were placed upon him, how to act, who to marry, how many children to have. Sure, as a prince he got pampered, but he could also see his life stretching out before him, all of his choices already made by someone else.

“So, the husband hunt isn’t going too well, I take it?” Jack inquires.

“Well.” Abigail’s mouth droops into a frown. “My father wants me to marry the CEO of LaserTech, because he’s a billionaire.”

“That sounds nice,” Jack smirks.

“He’s also fifty-six and obese.”

“Maybe he’s kind and funny,” Jack says with a smile, obviously trying to goad her.

“He’s hideous, actually. Arrogant, unrefined, and the way he treats his employees is despicable.”

“Well, if I were still the Prince of Gilboa, I’d offer you my hand in marriage, just to save you from this beast of a man.” His tone is light, it’s obviously a joke and she chuckles sweetly.

“Ah, but there is the rub, Jack. With Mr. LaserTech, I’d be praying every night that he wouldn’t come crawling into my bed to have his way with me. With you, I’d be begging you ravish me, and alas, I’d be sleeping alone.”

Jack can’t help the smirk that slides onto his face. He’s not even mad that she apparently knows about his preferences. Apparently everyone knew. If only they’d told him, he could have stopped his stupid playboy charade years ago.

“Not that I’m complaining,” Jack says, “since you might be the only other interesting person in this room, but I thought your father despised Moab.”

“Oh, he does, but,” her expression grows serious, “it’s the Philistines.”

“What about them?”

She glances around, making sure that they are alone in the corner. “On the satellite pictures, there are troop movements between Ekron and Ashdod. It seems that they are trying to centralize their power again, maybe reunite and invade all of us in an act of vengeance, 50 years in the making.”

“Well, we have no one to blame but ourselves for buying all of Ekron’s oil and making them rich. Money buys power after all.”

After Philistia had been broken into three separate nations, Ekron, the western nation had discovered vast oilfields off its shores, and Austeria, Ammon, Gilboa…everyone had greedily purchased it. If Ekron’s power had grown sufficiently for them to once again become a threat, the surrounding nations were to blame.

“So, my father is understandably nervous and willing to talk to anyone, even the president of Moab,” Abigail says. “Gath will certainly be the first in the line of fire if the Philistines invade, but the outlook for Gilboa and Ammon isn't good either.”

“Yeah.” Jack wonders if Silas knew the full threat of the Philistines when he made that speech acknowledging David’s butterfly crown. He’d mentioned that David could prove himself worthy of the throne by securing Austeria’s alliance with Gilboa. They had seemed to be empty words at the time, merely an excuse so that Silas wouldn’t have to admit defeat. But maybe he had been asking David and Jack to build a relationship with Austeria because he knew that the Philistines were coming.

“How about that king of—“

Jack’s phone vibrates in his pocket, interrupting the princess. He pulls it out and looks at the screen.

**David**

“Excuse me,” Jack says, smiling and trying to look penitent rather than ecstatic. “Important call, I really have to take it.”

He’s practically running from the room when he hits okay and says in his most professional voice, “Jack Benjamin.”

Regardless of his father’s words he refuses to change his last name.

“So, you’re still at the ball then?” David sounds slightly rummy like maybe he’s been drinking.

“Yes, yes, sir. Uh, just give me a second here.” Jack smiles at the other guests as he weaves through them. He spots Ezra, his bodyguard, dashing toward him, but waves him off. “I’ll just be in the hallway, Lieutenant Mason. Stay.”

“It’s midnight,” David says, not drunk but he’s definitely speaking more slowly than usual. “Planning on staying out all night?”

“I was definitely hoping not to,” Jack replies, finally managing to find a deserted hallway and walking quickly down it.

“So, are you still there because you haven’t found the man you’re taking home tonight?” He asks it with the pointed levity of a joke, but Jack can hear the edge of jealousy, or perhaps true concern, in David’s voice.

“I’m still here, you ass, because I’m trying to win us some fucking support from Moab’s senate.”

“So, there aren’t any cute boys there who you want to fuck?”

“How drunk are you?” Jack asks in complete exasperation.

“Somewhere between a little and a lot,” David replies with a chuckle.

“If you were here, I’d take you home,” Jack whispers, like a stupid lovesick teenager.

“Mmmm, and then what would you do to me?” David’s voice is low and completely hot. Jack sits down in a gorgeous antique chair by a vast window and tries not to get a boner. David has called a couple of times, but it’s been mostly business, and his morning texts are nothing but innocent, like _Wish I was waking up to your face_ or _Couldn’t sleep because I was thinking about you._  Phone sex has certainly not been on the schedule.

“You should go to sleep.”

“But I miss you.” David’s voice gets light and breathy, “Do you know what I’m doing right now?”

“I know that _I’m_ sitting in a hallway dressed in a tuxedo with dozens of politicians just down the hall.”

“That’s nice,” David replies. “I’m touching my cock.”

“Oh God,” Jack mutters, rubbing his face with his hand and trying to force himself to hang up before his erection grows to full mast.

“I’m thinking about how hot your mouth would feel wrapped around it,” David says, pausing briefly for Jack to interject. But what the hell can he say? Someone could wander down the hall or be hiding in one of the rooms and hear him. Apparently David takes his silence as an invitation to continue.

“I’m imagining your tongue rolling around it while you stick a finger up my ass.”

Jack’s breathing speeds up and he feels a bit flushed. The morning after they’d had sex David had roused Jack with a blowjob. It was a bit fumbling, of course, being David’s first blowjob, and technically it wasn’t anywhere close to being to the best blowjob that Jack had ever received. Except for the fact that it was absolutely the best, because it was David. How many times had he imagined those honeyed lips wrapped around his cock, those ice-blue eyes gazing up at him as David's tongue swirled around the tip? The fantasies were nothing compared to the reality.

They’d taken a shower afterward and Jack had paid David back with a blowjob of his own. He was already hours behind schedule for his departure to Moab and he didn’t care one bit. He was still easing David into all of the amazing things they were going to do together, so he’d steered clear of David’s ass during the blowjob. There was no need to rush into prostate play, and Jack was looking forward to blowing David’s mind with it when he got home.

“Why are you even thinking about my fingers being there?” Jack asks, conscious of every word and trying to keep the meaning ambiguous to any potential ears that might be listening.

David starts breathing harder. “It looked like you loved it so much, I decided to try. I have two fingers inside…oh God…inside of me.”

Jack is certainly fully erect now, with the image of David, golden and lovely, writhing and moaning, with his fingers inside of himself. Why the hell is he in Moab and not in bed with David? Who cares about gaining political favor with these arrogant senators? Who cares about Ekron and Austeria and Gilboa? Who cares about kingdoms when he could be in bed with David?

He drops his voice low, “I can’t do this right now, someone might hear.”

“Then just listen, baby,” David replies, “because I’m so fucking hard for you. You have no idea.”

“I have a bit of an idea.”

“Do you think about me when you’re jerking off?” David asks, his breathing still speeding up.

“Of course,” Jack says, wishing he could jerk off right now and hating David for doing this to him…but loving it all the same. “How are you even holding the phone?”

“Bluetooth, silly.” He can tell David’s smiling by his tone. “I found it, that thing inside of me, the thing that made you lose it when I was fucking you.”

“Congratulations,” Jack says sarcastically, but he’s smiling. David Shepherd probably didn’t even know he had a prostate before, and now he is rubbing it while talking dirty over the phone. Jack is definitely corrupting him and he loves it.

“It’s amazing. I want to know how it feels when you touch me there,” David says.

“You’re kind of destroying me right now.”

“Holy fuck.” David groans, just panting and moaning for a few seconds before replying, “I’m going to destroy you when you get home. I’m…mmm…I’m going to keep you in bed all fucking day and just, oh God, just…fuck you until you can’t stand.”

“Really?” Despite Jack’s inability to join in and find his own release at David’s words, he wants to hear more filthy promises from that beautiful mouth, that mouth that he used to think was so innocent.

“Yes, I’m going to bend you over the bed…uh, God…and pound you.”

Jack is breathing hard, in time with David. He can hear the build, can tell that David is close and asks, “What else?”

“I’m going to swallow your cock until I’m gagging, until…holy shit…oh, Jack…until I can’t breathe.”

“And then what?”

“Your hands are going to grab my hair and you are going to shove your cock down my throat…mmm…so hard…choking on your cock…oh God, Jack. Oh, fuck… _fuck_.”

David stops breathing for a second on the line. Jack can imagine how he looks, sprawled out, hand pumping his dick, head thrown back as he empties himself all over his belly. Jack shifts uncomfortably in his chair. There is no way he can go back to the ballroom now, flushed and horny and painfully hard.

David starts panting slowly, coming down from the high and moaning, “Mmm, Jack. Oh lord, I miss you.”

“I miss you too,” Jack whispers, hoping that no one can hear him.

“Only nine more days.”

“I can’t wait.”

David sounds sleepy and completely sated. Jack definitely needs to return to his hotel room immediately so he can masturbate.

“Goodnight, honey,” David says, sleepy and content.

The endearment fills Jack with warmth. He can’t even feel himself falling anymore because he’s already hit the ground. He’s already desperately in love with David Shepherd, which he could live with…he _had_ been living with it for months. But hearing David call him _baby_ and _honey,_ waking up to sweet texts about his eyes and his beauty every morning, it gives Jack hope that maybe David is falling in love with him too. And somehow that possibility has broken down all of his walls. He can feel his soul aligning with David’s. He can’t imagine ever wanting anyone else.

He’s been in love before, young, horny love with Eli and comfortable, sweet love with Joseph, but he’s never been this consumed by it. He’s never felt like he was drowning and didn’t even care. He’s welcoming the water as it envelops him. He _wants_ to drown and that’s the most frightening part.

“Goodnight, baby,” Jack whispers back.

* * *

He awakens to find three monarch butterflies flapping above his head, inside his room. His stomach clenches as he draws in a sharp breath. He’d left the window open last night because of the anomalous warmth. Maybe they are just lost butterflies, just confused, not a message from God. He sits up and raises his hand as if to shoo them away, and one instantly flaps toward his outstretched hand.

He freezes and it lands on his finger, so light he can hardly feel it.

“It’s You, isn’t it?” He asks and the other two butterflies land on the sheet next to him.

“Why now? You’ve never spoken just to me before, why now?” They don’t move or respond. He’s not entirely certain how this whole “message from God” thing even works, but the message is about David, he _knows_ that.

“I love him.” It’s a faint gasp and the first time he’s ever admitted it aloud. “I swear, I’m not using him. I’m not plotting. God, please. I just want to help him, I swear. You have to believe me. You do believe me, right?”

As one, all three butterflies take off and fly haphazardly toward the window. Jack sighs. It’s done. It was just a simple question from God and he answered it correctly and now everything will be fine. But the monarchs stop in the open window, flapping and waiting…for Jack.

Jack’s head falls onto the pillow. “No. No.”

He feels the message course through him. _Follow._ And it’s laced with dread. He knows that wherever they will lead him, pain is coming. He doesn’t know why he’s certain, but he is, like God is saying, _You have to follow for there is truth at the end of this path whether it is the truth you seek or not._

It’s God and he can’t say _No._

He dons his clothes and shoes in a hurry, turning to the waiting butterflies as he opens the door, “Meet you downstairs?”

He hopes not, but they are there waiting for him and they turn west immediately and then alight on top of a car. He walks behind them and they keep doing it, heading due west then landing on a car, due west then landing on a car.

“But you can’t fly that fast,” Jack says getting a strange look from a passerby.

Ezra Mason comes running down the hotel stairs, frantically trying to button his jacket, as Jack turns back to ask the concierge for his car.

“Major Benjamin, sir.” Ezra’s rosy-cheeked and panting from running. “Captain Shepherd asked me to protect you and I can’t do that when you dash off without telling me.”

“I need our car,” Jack says, glancing back at the three hovering butterflies. “Just get me the car, Mason.”

Ezra’s eyes follow Jack’s gaze. “Holy shit.”

He dashes back to the concierge, desperately trying to find his valet ticket, swearing profusely.

“Mason,” Jack yells, still staring down the butterflies. “They’re insects, they only live for, like, two days, so time is of the essence.”

“Of course, sir.” Ezra shoves the valet ticket at the concierge and begs him to hurry.

Ezra takes the wheel and drives them west, going slowly behind the butterflies and getting honked at for his trouble, but then Jack spots a different set of three butterflies ahead and hears the voice in his head, _Follow._

“There,” he says, pointing for Ezra, “Just drive with traffic, I’ll keep my eyes peeled.”

They follow, from one threesome of butterflies to the next, finally turning onto a major throughway and traveling south for almost two hours before Jack spots a group of butterflies telling them to exit. They’re deep in the countryside, farmland rolling past as he scans the horizon for the next triumvirate of black and orange, signifying the next street to turn down. Thirty minutes and a few missed turns later and they are pulling up to a white two-story farmhouse with a red shingle roof and a wraparound porch. There are cornfields in the distance and a huge maple tree in the front lawn. It’s beautifully picturesque, but Jack still feels only trepidation.

The butterflies alight upon the porch railing. He’s here. This is where God wants him to be. But fear holds him immobilized. Is it Silas? Is it his uncle? Is it a trap and he’s about to be hauled back to Gilboa and forced to produce an heir with Lucinda?

But it doesn’t seem right that God would set traps and play tricks.

And then he hears the shrill sound of a baby laughing from inside the house. His heart melts from his body. The selfish part of him wants to tell Ezra to turn around and drive back to the hotel, but somehow he forces himself to open the door.

“Sir?” Ezra begins to open his door as well, his other hand dropping to the gun at his belt.

“Ezra, stay.”

“But it could be a trap.”

“It isn’t. Just trust me and please stay in the car.”

Ezra nods, displeased but loyal and closes the car door as Jack walks on shaking legs up the steps. He takes a deep breath and knocks.

She looks beautiful when she opens the door, no make up, a slight tan and a natural glow.

“Jack?”

She’s crying…with joy…and Jack’s never felt like such a backstabbing jerk as he does when Michelle’s arms wrap around him and she pulls him into a hug.

* * *

Everything is a blur, the conversation, Michelle, the baby. Jack feels like he does right after a firefight, his hearing is muted and everything is in slow motion.

_Where are your bodyguards? Shouldn’t someone have stopped me from just driving up?_

“They’ve been here every day for months but this morning, they had to leave for an emergency. Other guards were supposed to replace them, but they never arrived. I didn’t even understand it, but then you showed up. How did you find me?”

“God?”

* * *

_What’s her name?_

“Tamara.”

_She’s beautiful. She looks like you._

“Really? I thought she looked more like David, what with the blonde hair.”

_Yeah, maybe…David._

* * *

“How is David? They never tell me anything here. Have you heard anything about him? Do you know where he is?”

_Do I know? Yeah, I know._

* * *

Jack can’t believe that he and Ezra successfully smuggle Princess Michelle Benjamin and her eight-month-old baby out of Moab and into Austeria. It shouldn’t be possible. This must be what it’s like to do God’s work, to be David Shepherd. Things just work out, paths open up, people look the other way. Jack’s life has never, not even for a second, been like this. He has fought and struggled for everything, apparently because God was never on his side.

But God still isn’t on his side now, or he and Michelle would get caught. He feels horrible for wishing that someone would stop them, that Silas’ men would show up and take Michelle back to that farmhouse so he can return to David and act like this never happened. Jack knows that these selfish, despicable thoughts are the reason that God widens their path back to David even more.

The following day, they are driving up to another house, in a beautiful gated community in Bozrah. David comes bounding down the stairs after he sees Jack get out of the car, smiling and slightly confused.

“I wasn’t expecting you for another week,” he says. But before Jack can answer, the passenger door opens and David’s eyes angle away from him, landing on Michelle. Jack vanishes back in the blackness of the void as David’s star turns away from him. He can already feel him slipping away…slipping…and David hasn’t even seen the best part yet.

“Michelle?” David gasps, frozen halfway down the stairs. Jack watches everything unfold from the outside, just an observer.

Michelle opens the back door and unhooks Tamara from the car seat, hoisting her onto her hip and turning back to David who is visibly shaking. Michelle approaches him slowly, smiling widely as David merely gapes.

“David, this is Tamara, your daughter.”

David takes three wobbling steps down the stairs, meeting Michelle halfway and cups his left hand gently around Tamara’s head. A single tear slides down his cheek.

“She’s…beautiful. Oh Michelle.”

“You can hold her,” Michelle says and David takes his baby carefully, obviously worried he’s going to break her. Then he’s crying completely and Michelle’s head is bending forward, her forehead touching David’s as they gaze down at their daughter together.

Only Ezra notices when Jack slips past them and escapes into the house.


	11. I'm not dying but I bleed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from "My Blood" by Ellie Goulding

Three hours, sixteen minutes since Jack left them on the stairs.

There’s a knock on the door.

Jack doesn’t move. He hasn’t moved in over an hour. The first hour he packed. The second hour he threw things and then cried. The third hour he sat on the edge of his bed, numb.

There’s another knock and then David’s voice.

Jack doesn’t move.

Apparently, he didn’t lock the door, because David opens it and lingers in the doorway.

“Jack?” His voice is hesitant.

Jack doesn’t move.

David enters and closes the door, surveying the damage to the room and finally the three packed (and still open) suitcases by the closet.

“Why haven’t you unpacked?”

Jack doesn’t move.

“Jack?”

“What?” It’s harsh and ragged. He wishes he looked put-together, but his eyes are red-rimmed from crying and he looks like shit.

“You disappeared and I was worried.”

“She’s beautiful,” Jack whispers.

David smiles. “I know.”

“And she hardly ever cries. An entire day on the road and only one tantrum. Good-natured, just like her parents.”

“Jack.” David finally crosses the room and kneels in front of him as he sits on the bed. “I can’t express my eternal gratitude toward you for finding her. For bringing her to me.”

Jack lifts the corner of his mouth in the mimic of a smile. He is genuinely happy for David even though his own soul is fissured. He hates himself for the moments on the road when he wanted to deny David the joy of meeting his first-born child just for the selfish reason of keeping David to himself.

God was right to punish him.

“Don’t do this,” David murmurs, cupping Jack’s cheek and leaning forward trying to capture Jack’s gaze.

Jack wishes he were strong enough to push David’s hand away. He’s not.

“Tell me what’s going on in your head, please.” David waits, always patient.

“I’ve never asked because I never wanted to know,” Jack says quietly, the words forming in his mouth without conscious thought, as if he’s compelled by the force of David’s patience to divulge the honesty of his feelings, “but that ring you wear on your left hand.”

It’s the hand that’s cupping Jack’s cheek, the cold metal a stark contrast to David’s hot skin. David pulls his hand away, lightly touching the metal with his thumb. He looks resolved for a painful conversation, like he sees the path that Jack has started down.

“It’s my sister’s ring. I know that. She gave it to you the night you fled Gilboa, right?”

David nods, lips pursed and brow furrowed.

“You never mentioned it, so I told myself it was simply a token, a promise of a promise,” Jack continues. “But I knew it was a lie when I thought it. It is, right? A lie?”

David doesn’t react at all. It’s answer enough, but Jack needs to know for sure. He can’t live that lie anymore with Michelle under the same roof.

“Are you married to her…in the eyes of the Lord?”

The pause before David whispers “Jack” is the worst part. The tears are there, but Jack pushes them back.

“Please, David, just say it.” There is another horrible pause. “Just fucking say it.”

“Yes,” David whispers and sits back on his heels, no longer trying to touch Jack or catch his eye. He looks lost and overwhelmed and confused. For a second Jack feels like an asshole doing this now, right after David learned that he has a daughter, that he’s already missed the first eight months of her life, right after getting his…his _wife_ …back. But Jack is leaving tonight, so if he doesn’t do this now, he never will.

“I hope I was a good stand-in for her.”

“Don’t say that. You know that isn’t what this is,” David’s eyes are starting to get hazy with unshed tears.

“What this _is_? David, this _isn’t_ anything. Maybe it was _almost_ something. But you love my sister.”

He says it as a statement, but he means it as a question and he desperately wants the answer to be “no.”

“I also love you,” David replies.

The first time David has ever said he loves Jack and it’s tainted with the _also._

“Well, I don’t love you,” Jack snaps, finally raising his eyes to look at David. He’s surprised how easily the lie rolls off his tongue and how true it sounds. Lies still come naturally to him, that’s something even the bright shining soul of David couldn’t burn out of him.

“Don’t say that.” David pauses, probably wanting some admission of love from Jack. When it doesn’t come, he continues a bit desperately, “I know that you’re upset and I understand why. So, let’s not do this now, not like this. You just need some sleep. It was a long journey. We both just need some sleep.”

“And whose bed are you going to sleep in tonight?”

“My own,” David replies quickly. It slightly dulls the pain in Jack’s chest, but it doesn’t change his decision. Eventually David will choose a bed, and it will be Michelle’s…it _should_ be Michelle’s. David is destined to be king and Michelle can give him more children. She can give him respectability. A king needs a queen and heirs, not a gay-lover who led a coup against his own father, a man who nobody trusts.

“I’m leaving,” Jack says after a long pause.

“You don’t have to leave your own room. If you need privacy, just tell me.”

“I didn’t mean that I’m leaving the room. I meant I’m leaving…tonight.”

“Where?”

“I don’t know,” Jack says, curling his hands in his lap, “but I’m going.”

“Please, _don’t_.”

“You and Michelle and Tamara need some time—“

“Jack.” David leans forward, kneeling and taking both of Jack’s hands in his own, squeezing them just a bit too tightly. “Don’t do this right now. Please just wait a couple of days…I just met my daughter, Jack, _my daughter_. I can’t even think straight right now.”

“That’s exactly why I need to leave.”

Jack pulls his hands away from David’s, annoyed when David leaves his hands resting on Jack’s knees. He shoves them off and David deflates, falling back onto the floor, sitting against the dresser and propping his elbows on his knees.

“Don’t push me away,” David mutters. “You told me once that this is what you do when you’re threatened, you push people away. You said it was a fault, something you didn’t want to do, so stop doing it to me.”

Like a lightning strike, Jack goes from numb to enraged in less than a heartbeat. He’s up and throwing anything he can get his hands on, clothes, books. He even manages to shatter a glass against the wall before David can grab him by the shoulders. Jack swings at him, but it’s wild with anguish and David easily dodges it, spinning Jack and pushing him toward the wall.

“Please, stop,” David begs. Jack tries to push him away, but his heart isn’t in it. He can smell David’s shampoo, feel the heat in his touch. David cups his face with his right hand and Jack melts into it. Weak.

There’s a second of complete silence. The eye of the storm. Then David’s lips are crashing into his, possessive and demanding. A scrape of teeth and David is claiming him with his tongue, his lips, holding the back of his head so he can’t escape.

Jack whimpers, knowing he needs to stop this. He grasps David’s shirt to push him away, but instead he pulls him closer. David laces his hand in Jack’s hair, which is still shaggy and easy to grip. He tugs Jack’s head back forcefully and plunges his tongue into Jack’s mouth. David seems frantic and desperate, like he is trying to prove something, but what, Jack isn’t certain. His hand drops to Jack’s groin and he rubs him through the fabric of his jeans, needy and possessive. Jack’s body responds without thought, grinding his hardening cock against David’s palm, whimpering again.

He needs to stop this. Now.

David cups his hands on either side of Jack’s face, pushes Jack roughly against the wall with his own body, and devours his mouth, like he’s trying to steal Jack’s breath. Silence him. Claim him.

The entire universe collapses to this kiss, the firmness of David’s lips, the sound of his moans, the taste…

…The taste. It probably isn’t Michelle. Jack’s scattered brain is probably just imagining that David’s mouth tastes different, too sweet. It’s probably nothing, but all of a sudden, Jack can’t wipe the thought that the wrong taste on David’s lips is Michelle. That he just came from kissing Michelle.

Jack pushes him roughly, breaking the kiss. David looks destroyed and still ridiculously attractive. His lips are flushed and slightly swollen and it takes all of Jack’s strength to resist the urge to push David onto the bed and punish him for all of this. Punish him for…for what? For having a baby with the woman he loves? The woman he chose long before he even noticed Jack.

 _That’s not true,_ he thinks. David had wanted him since that mission to Gath. If it hadn’t been for his ridiculous skirt-chasing charade, he could have had David first. He could have claimed him before Michelle did. David could have been his.

Jack lets out an anguished cry and slides down the wall until he’s sitting, a crumpled heap on the floor. He pushes David away when he bends down and tries to touch him.

“Gilboa will need more international support if the Philistines attack,” Jack says, his voice raw and broken despite the calm of his words.

“Please, just wait a couple of days. You just got back.”

“I’ve been thinking of going to Europe,” Jack replies as if David hasn’t spoken. “I have some connections in France, but I need to move on them.”

“You can’t go to France.”

“Yes I can, actually. Since Austeria was kind enough to grant me a passport, I can go anywhere I want.”

“That’s not what I meant.” David reaches for him again and Jack slaps his hand away. He doesn’t want a repeat of that kiss because he might not be strong enough to stop it a second time. “You won’t be safe from your father. France hasn’t extended diplomatic immunity to you like Moab did. You can’t go.”

“I don’t need immunity. I wasn’t accused of treason like the rest of you.”

“Jack.” David looks a bit desperate and on the verge of tears. “What can I do? Just tell me what I can do to make you stay.”

Jack looks up, “You can’t.”

David’s face breaks instantly, his mouth contorting and tears welling in his eyes. He's kneeling on the floor next to Jack and he reaches out, rubbing the fabric of Jack's shirt between his fingers, soothingly, lovingly, a question. He obviously wants to touch Jack, but he's waiting for a signal that it's okay. David is waiting for him to have another moment of weakness and it makes Jack hate him even more. This is the hardest thing he has ever had to do, and David isn't fucking helping at all, fighting Jack's dismissal with love and desperation and hunger, like Jack matters to him.

It would be easier if David were treating him with detached disdain right now, like Jack is a dirty mistake that he wants to forget.

“How long?” David asks and Jack’s so lost in the numbness it takes a few seconds to figure out what David is asking. How long will Jack be gone.

“A couple weeks. A month, maybe,” Jack replies, knowing it’s a lie, but David won’t let him go if he tells him the truth.

 _Forever,_ he thinks and hopes he’s strong enough to keep that promise.

“Jack, please,” he looks gutted.

Jack has always suspected that God hates him, but now he knows. God did this on purpose. He let Jack have a taste of pure bliss just so He could turn it into ash. It’s Jack’s punishment for all of his crimes, for the murders, the betrayals. Silas locked him in a room and forced him to have sex with a woman. God gave him the most beautiful man he’s ever known and then ripped him away.

God certainly wins this one.

“Please, just wait until tomorrow. Just go to sleep and wait until tomorrow and we can talk some more.” David’s voice breaks slightly on the last few words.

Jack stares at the carpet and contemplates doing just that, waiting a couple of days. But if he does, David will figure out how to make him stay. He will say the right words and Jack will lose his resolve. And then he’ll be trapped in a house with David, his wife and his baby and no escape from the constant pain.

He has to leave tonight or early tomorrow morning, but David won’t accept that as an answer, so Jack nods and says, “Okay.”

“Good.” David nods too, instantly looking less distraught, thinking that he’ll have another chance to convince Jack to stay. “Good. We’ll talk tomorrow.”

David stays long after Jack drops his head into hands so he doesn’t have to look at him. He doesn’t cry. He’s too broken for tears. David sits beside him for nearly an hour, not touching him, not talking, just being with him, until finally he wordlessly gets up and leaves.

* * *

Jack finds them later in the sitting room, lounging together on an antique brocade couch, Tamara asleep in David’s arms. They are facing away from him as he stands in the doorway. So he turns quickly, trying to escape, but his steps must make a sound because Michelle swivels and smiles.

“Jack?”

David looks up, but there is no smile, just…worry? Jack can’t identify the expression, he’s never seen David wear it before.

Jacks sighs, loosens his body and tries for nonchalance as he saunters into the room and sits in the couch across from them. He drapes himself across it, trying too hard to look casual, angling his body and resting an arm across the back of the couch.

He’s taken a shower and cleaned himself up. He doesn’t look like he just made out with, and broke up with, his sister’s sort-of husband. He looks respectable.

Almost immediately, Jack notices how Michelle’s left hand is resting against David’s right knee, not on it, but right next to it, the backs of her fingers touching David.

He stares, breath shortening, nostrils flaring. David must notice because he moves his knee away from Michelle’s hand and his lips are pursed in apology when Jack’s eyes rise back up to his face.

This situation is never going to work.

“Michelle,” Jack’s voice is strained, “I was wondering if I could talk to you. Alone.”

“Of course, we didn’t get much privacy on the drive. There were things I wanted to ask you about, anyway.”

“Mind if I steal her, David?” It’s an innocent enough question. People say it all of the time, but David’s eyes narrow. He can hear the steel in Jack’s voice.

“Of course, why would I mind?”

“Can’t imagine,” Jack snaps.

“Jack, come on.” Michelle seems annoyed with them as she stands up. “You said you two were friends now, but it sure as hell doesn’t seem like it.”

“Well, we’re as close to being friends as we can be,” Jack replies. “Isn’t that right, David? We’re friends.”

“Yeah, we are,” David says, his head tilting downward so he’s staring at Jack through his lashes, concern and longing etched into the lines of his face. It shouldn’t be hot, but it is. It shouldn’t cause the blood to rush to Jack's groin, but it does.

Jack smirks, cocks his eyebrow, tries to act like he doesn't care, and follows Michelle down two hallways and into the kitchen. He pours each of them a glass of whisky and they sit at the kitchen table, exactly where David first confessed his feelings for Jack three weeks ago.

“I’m leaving for France first thing tomorrow and I just wanted to say ‘goodbye.’”

“Why are you going to France?”

“Father still wants David for treason. I can leave Austeria. He can’t.”

“I mean why are you leaving tomorrow morning? We just got here.”

“You and David have been parted for a long time. I’m trying to give you space, so just say ‘thank you.’” Jack can’t keep the pettiness and hurt from his voice, but he’s always had a sullen disposition so Michelle seems unfazed.

“Space? With eight other soldiers living in this house, we aren’t really going to have space whether you’re here or not.”

“I just think it would be better if I wasn’t here,” Jack says. “I was planning this trip anyway. I’m just leaving a couple days early.”

It’s a lie, but Michelle doesn’t know that.

She studies Jack for a few seconds, so intensely that Jack grows uncomfortable. “Why would it be better if you weren’t here?”

“Because everyone’s life would be better if I wasn’t here,” he replies.

“I didn’t think you could take melodramatic self-pity any farther than you used to, but I guess you can.”

“It’s not self-pity if it’s the truth,” Jack replies, taking a sip of whisky and leaning back into his chair. He knows how he must sound, like a whiny asshole, but his heart is a gaping wound and he means every word he’s saying. If only they could understand that he isn’t looking for pity or fishing for compliments. He’s just not afraid to state the truth, unlike them.

She studies him again. Maybe Michelle does understand.

“What have you and David been doing here together?” she asks.

Jack breathes in sharply. She knows. But if she knows why didn’t she mention it on the two-day trip from Moab? They’d talk a bit, but Ezra was sitting in the backseat and there had been so much to cover, Jack’s imprisonment, the Gilboan-Gath war, the truce, the fake capture of David, the butterfly crown plus Michelle had talked about the pregnancy, the baby, the secret phone calls from their mother.

“What do you mean?” He manages to keep his voice even.

“What are you planning?”

“What do you mean?”

She sighs in annoyance, “You actually think I believe this? That you and David are friends and that you are trying to help him become king? You have wanted to be king your entire life. You’ve lashed out at every individual who ever threatened your chances of becoming king, and now you want me to believe that you don’t have an ulterior motive?”

The knot in his gut unwinds. She doesn’t know about them…but if she did would she leave David in a fit of anger? It’s tempting.

“I didn’t really want to be king.”

She laughs in disbelief. “You used to be better at lying.”

“It’s not a lie.”

“Except I remember when you wanted to be king so badly that you asked a guard to point a gun at your own sister.”

He downs the rest of his whisky. He’d been expecting, and dreading, this conversation the entire journey from Moab.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, unable to meet her eye.

“Or is that not why you pointed the gun at me?”

Normally he’d fight back, tell her how she’d turned on him first, when he had simply been trying to hold their fragile country together. But he’s too exhausted from the incident with David to fight. The dead feeling is expanding inside his chest and engulfing everything.

“I didn’t know what to do,” he replies quietly, still gazing at the empty glass in his hands. “That’s why I did it, because I didn’t know _what_ to do. I didn’t know how to fix anything or make anyone believe in me. I didn’t know how to be king. _There,_ I admit it, I didn’t know how to be king.” He looks up, voice strained and high. “Are you happy now?”

“And so now you want David, a man you despise, to be king instead? Really?”

“I don’t despise him.”

So she really doesn’t know. He wonders what she’d think if she knew about their night together, that Jack knows what David looks like when he’s coming, what he tastes like, how filthy his language becomes when he’s turned on. Jack still has all of the text messages on his phone. He could completely destroy David and Michelle’s relationship by simply showing them to her. But it would ruin David and Jack’s relationship too.

That’s not why he refrains, though. He doesn’t show Michelle because those text messages belong to him and no one else is allowed to see them. David sent them to him.

“Why are you _really_ trying to help him, Jack?”

He can’t tell her the truth, that he believes in David and loves him.

“Because God wants David to be king, and I accept that.”

“And God didn’t want you to be king?”

He’s grateful that she makes it a genuine question.

“No. Never. I’m trying to make amends to Him…to God, whether you believe or not. He knows and that’s all that matters. That’s why I’m helping David. For God.”

She doesn’t reply for so long Jack gets lost in his thoughts of David, of that night they had together and how the memory will slowly fade until he can’t remember exactly what David said before they started kissing, or the exact expression on David’s face when he slid into Jack.

Michelle pours him another finger of whisky and hands him the glass. She’s smiling slightly when he looks up at her.

“I can tell that David believes in you. Whatever’s happened during the past year, he trusts you, but he’s always been too trusting, so I had to ask, Jack.”

“He shouldn’t trust me and neither should you.”

“I don’t,” Michelle says with sad eyes.

“Good, it means you’re learning.”

“You don’t have to leave.”

“I’m trying to give you two some space, so just fucking say ‘thank you.’”

She smiles, a melancholy smiles, and takes a delicate sip of her drink. She holds the glass like a queen even when she’s drinking whisky, refined and lovely. She’ll make a beautiful queen someday.

Jack closes his eyes and thinks, _God, I’m giving him up for her, for the baby, for You. I’m giving him up for Gilboa so it can have the king it deserves. This better be enough, because if You make me give up anything else, I’m fucking done with You forever._


	12. A hundred billion bottles

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning: consensual bondage/masochism, but for unhealthy emotional reasons. Don't worry, it's not what you think.
> 
> Chapter Title from "Message in a Bottle" by The Police.

France is lovely, not that Jack notices. Princess Abigail lets him stay, rent-free, in one of her family’s flats. She also sets him up with a bodyguard even though he insists that he doesn’t need one. If his father captures him, if someone kills him, who fucking cares. He doesn’t.

Within a few days Jack finds himself high and dancing with a beautiful Algerian in a gay club. Jack doesn’t even take him to the back room. He grinds against him on the crowded dance floor for all of the world to see…if it cares. It turns out it does care, or at least the celebrity magazines and paparazzi care.

He takes the man back to his apartment and fucks him. It doesn’t help.

But it’s the beginning of the slow slide into drunken oblivion and anonymous sex. He forgets about his promises to God, that he’s here to help David. God owes him one. He deserves a break. He deserves to self-medicate with drugs and men. So he does, almost every night for weeks.

He fully expects to be abducted by his father’s men and hauled back to Gilboa, despite the bodyguard.

He doesn’t care when he sees the pictures in the tabloids of himself kissing a man in front of a nightclub during his second week in France, his hands laced in the man’s hair and his groin pushing the man against the wall. When a paparazzo stops him in front of a nightclub later and asks Jack if he’s gay, he looks straight into the camera and says “Yes,” right before plunging his tongue into the mouth of the man he’s taking home. He doesn’t know the man’s name. It doesn’t matter.

After a few weeks, he realizes that his father isn’t coming for him. Capturing him would be an admission that Jack is his son, that Jack matters to him. He truly has been cast out into the world, no better than a bastard. In fact, Silas is probably enjoying the show, watching Jack destroy himself with booze, drugs and men.

* * *

David calls almost everyday at first, even though Jack never answers. He listens to the voicemails though, hearing sadness slip into frustration and finally anger.

“Jack, it’s David, will you please just call me back?”

“Jack, David. I need to talk to you. Are you ever going to talk to me again?”

“Jack, I saw the papers. I’m glad you aren’t hiding your sexuality anymore, but did you have to do it like this? You don’t seem happy, please just call me.”

“Jack, it’s David. How many men are you going to take home? Because it’s…you’re killing me. You’re fucking killing me.”

“Jack, do you want me to chase you to France and get arrested by your father? Do you want me to turn my back on everything we’ve done for the future of Gilboa? Is that what you want? Will you just fucking answer your phone when I call? Damn it, Jack.”

Michelle calls the morning after the paparazzi snap pictures of him leaving a club with two Italians. He never goes for blonds anymore.

Both men are still sleeping in his bed when he hits  **Okay**  on his phone and mutters, “Big sister, to what do I owe the pleasure?”

“It’s David.”

The world feels like it’s spinning out of control, but that might be the ecstasy that’s still coursing through his blood.

“Great, now I won’t answer calls from my sister ever again.”

“I just want to know if you’re okay. If I could leave Austeria, I’d be in France right now because I’m concerned about you.”

“Well, you don’t have to worry about me, _Mom,_ I’m doing just fine.”

“Jack, please—“

“No,” Jack says loudly, causing the two men in his bed to glance up groggily. “Get the fucking hint. I don’t answer your phone calls because I don’t want to fucking talk to you.”

“Jack—“

“Stop stalking me!”

“I’m not—“

“I don’t fucking love you, so just fucking stop!”

There’s a long, painful silence and then, “I know that you’re hurting and that’s why you are doing what you are doing. I’m just worried.”

“I’m wearing condoms, is that what you want to hear, _Mom_? I promise I’m being a responsible little faggot.”

“Damn it, Jack. I can’t chase you to France. You know that. So stop throwing this tantrum.” His voice chokes up.

“It’s not a tantrum. I’m not a baby. I’m living my life the way I want to live it. _Finally._ ”

“You’re running because you’re scared,” David responds, his words rushed and high-pitched, like he’s a bit desperate.

“Uh, fuck you.”

“Because you love me, so stop pushing me away.”

“It was fun, David, being the one to defile you,” Jack whispers. It hurts so much to say it, but he has to. God told him to give David up. He has to give him up.

“Don’t do this, you fucking ass.” David’s voice is low, full of hurt and anger.

“You were a good fuck. It was fun. I had fun. But you have your queen and your child now, so why dwell on it? Why act like it was something it wasn’t? It was just a fuck.”

“Jack, stop.”

“I’m sorry, David, if you thought it was more. But I don’t love you.”

“This is how you’re going to do this? After everything we’ve been through, this is what you want to do?” David’s voice is so wretchedly quiet, Jack almost can’t hear him.

“I’m just being honest. I’m sorry if that hurts you; it’s not my intention. I’d really appreciate it if you stopped harassing me now.” He’s proud of himself for keeping his voice even despite the tear running down his cheek.

David pauses, but Jack can still hear his breathing, harsh and ragged before he finally says, “Is that what you want, really? You want me to leave you alone?”

_No! Please just leave Michelle and Tamara, risk getting captured by my father and show up at my door._

“Yes, that’s what I want.”

“Okay.” David’s voice is weak. “I won’t call you again, on my phone or Michelle’s so please don’t ignore her calls because you think it might be me. It won’t be. I promise.”

David always keeps his promises. He doesn’t call Jack, doesn’t text or email…or show up with flowers at Jack’s front door.

Eventually, Jack stops wishing that he would. But he doesn’t delete the text messages.

* * *

Jack’s been in France for three months when the first pictures of David and Michelle surface on the web. They are on every news site, even the respectable ones, with headlines like **Gilboan Princess and Goliath-slayer in Love and in Hiding.**

Jack adds whisky to his coffee that morning and tries not to snap at Henri when he pads into the kitchen and kisses Jack’s cheek.

He met Henri last month. It isn’t love, but Jack was growing bored with bringing a new boy home every night. He needed a break from the clubs and alcohol. And Henri is nothing like David, dark hair and dark eyes, bronze complexion, sarcastic and shallow.

“What are you looking at?”

“My sister escaped exile and she’s living with David Shepherd in Austeria.”

Henri scrolls through the articles and pictures.

“Zat’s nice.”

“Yeah,” Jack mutters. He and Henri don’t have an honest relationship, which is just what Jack wants. All he needs is a warm hard body in his bed when he’s horny. He doesn’t need long heartfelt conversations about feelings and fate and love. He’s had enough of that for a lifetime.

* * *

King Silas claims that Austeria is holding his daughter against her will and that he will do whatever it takes to retrieve her.

Jack knows exactly how David and Michelle will respond, but it still rips his heart in two when the video surfaces.

He clicks the link on his computer of David standing at a press conference. He doesn’t look good. His eyes look sunken and dark like he isn’t getting enough sleep and there is a sadness in him, in the way he holds his body, in the tenor of his voice. Jack’s never seen him look so dead on the inside before.

“Good afternoon. Thank you very much for providing me with this opportunity to address the accusations of King Silas of Gilboa directly. I love Michelle Benjamin,” David says and Jack’s heart constricts. “I have for years. She is not being held in Austeria against her will. She is my wife in the eyes of God, although we are not formally married. But, we will be. And…”

David pauses and motions to someone off screen. “Michelle?”

Jack takes a deep breath and wipes away the tears that are accumulating in his eyes.

Michelle is smiling, holding Tamara on her hip. She’s so big now, not that it should be surprising since she’s a year old. She looks like David, blonde and sweet.

David turns back to the camera, smiling, “This is Tamara, our child. I ask that King Silas respect our love and our relationship. I ask that he not rip our family apart for his own selfish gain.”

David stands aside and takes Tamara who wriggles slightly in his arms, while Michelle looks into the cameras.

“I do not want to return to Gilboa and I hope that as David Shepherd’s fiancée, I can remain here…with my family. Mom, Dad, please just let us be.”

They look so perfect and regal, a complete picturesque family with no place for the fucked-up fag brother who once stupidly thought himself good enough for God’s chosen. Jack rests his head on the table next to the computer and cries, thankful that Henri is at work so he doesn’t have to explain why his sister’s happiness is causing him nothing but pain.

* * *

The following week, Jack’s mother arrives on a diplomatic journey to Paris.

Jack and Henri go to Scotland.

She follows them to Scotland. They head to Norway.

Pictures surface of Rose Benjamin getting off of a plane in Oslo. Jack and Henri hop a flight to Romania.

She thankfully gives up after that.

* * *

Jack is sipping wine on his balcony, watching autumn envelop Paris like a fiery-hued veil, when his phone chirps with a text message from David.

**_Tamara is sick. Please come back._ **

He gazes at David’s name on his phone for two full minutes before calling Michelle instead.

She is crying. The doctors have conducted countless tests on Tamara and they still know nothing. Michelle is certain it’s God. He’s punishing Michelle for breaking her promise to devote her life to selfless pursuits. God is punishing her for sleeping with David.

That seems to be the trend with God and David Shepherd. Everyone who sleeps with him suffers.

“Do you want me to come back?” Jack asks, hoping she’ll say “no.”

“Only if you want to, but we won’t be in Bozrah. We have to take her to a specialist in some city in the east. Let me find the name…”

Jack decides to stay in Paris.

* * *

Michelle sounds more lost and exhausted with each day. Tamara’s condition is worsening. Finally, after a few weeks, Jack purchases a plane ticket to Austeria. He doesn’t know if he’ll be strong enough to sit in a room with David and Michelle, but he simply can’t avoid it anymore. The child is his niece and he needs to be there.

Jack stumbles back home to Henri the night before his flight, drunk and high on cocaine.

“Fuck me, baby,” he says, crawling onto the bed and straddling Henri. “I need you to fuck me hard.”

“What are you on right now?”

“What am I on?” Jack chuckles darkly, snaking a hand into Henri’s boxers and stroking his cock. “Well, I’m still not on your dick where I should be. How about you correct that? _Baise-moi maintenant._ ”

Henri sits up and tries to kiss Jack, but that isn’t how he wants it. No sweetness. No tenderness. Nothing that even resembles _making love._

He needs pain.

“Tie me up,” he says, pulling away and throwing the ropes at Henri, who obliges and secures Jack’s hands behind his back.

Henri gets up to grab the lube from the dresser.

“No, forget the lube, I want it to hurt.”

Henri tilts his head, disbelief in his eyes. “ _Non,_ Jack.”

Jack slides off the bed and pushes Henri against the dresser with just his body. He plunges his tongue into Henri’s mouth, forceful and demanding, and then kisses a trail from Henri’s mouth to his ear, whispering, “Fine, use your spit if you must, but I want it to hurt.”

“Jack, what eez wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong, baby,” Jack murmurs, licking and sucking the shell of his ear until the tension drains from Henri’s body. Jack’s not sure if it’s the language barrier or Henri’s personality, but he never sees through Jack’s lies like David did. Ever. It’s the reason Jack keeps him around.

“Call it a going-away present. I want this,” Jack whispers, grinding his cock against Henri. “Just make it hurt, baby. I’ll say the word if it hurts too much. I promise. I just want something to remember you by when I’m in Austeria, that’s all.”

Jack can sense the moment when Henri finally gives in. His muscles relax right before he spins Jack and pushes him facedown onto the bed.

Henri does what he’s asked. He makes it hurt, not too much, just enough. He makes Jack’s body feel like his heart feels, raw and broken.

“Yes, _comme ça, Henri,_ ” Jack gasps in time to the rough thrusts of Henri’s cock. “ _Oui. C’est si bon. Oui, bon._ ”

Jack oversleeps the following morning and misses his flight to Austeria.

* * *

David’s leg is shaking uncontrollably with nerves as he sits on the hard plastic chair in the airport, waiting for Jack’s plane to land.

Jack is flying out of Charles De Gaulle, making a connection in JFK for his flight to Bozrah. David watches the flight information impatiently as Jack’s flight status switches to  **Landing**  and finally  **At Gate.**

Jack’s here.

David is a bubbling mess of excitement and fear. He keeps gripping the armrest, tapping his nails on the plastic until the person sitting next to him leaves in annoyance.

The automated doors from the terminal swing open and David springs up, searching the faces of the passengers as he anxiously rocks from one foot to the other.

“Is this the flight from JFK?” he asks someone.

“Yeah,” an older lady answers with a smile.

David keeps searching as the passengers exit in waves. He’s jealous of every other person who smiles and hugs a passenger, reuniting with a loved one while David is still waiting.

He’s the only one left standing, and still no Jack. Minutes pass by and there are no more waves of passengers. He tracks down an airport worker.

“Sir, is this the only door that the passengers can leave the terminal from?”

“Yes.”

David sits back down and waits. Maybe Jack is just in the bathroom.

Ten minutes. Thirty minutes. An hour.

Jack isn’t coming. David finally accepts it. He missed his flight, probably on purpose.

David slumps down in the seat. He feels drained from all of his previous nervous energy. And stupid, he feels stupid. Of course Jack missed his flight, because he doesn’t care enough about David or Michelle or Tamara. He has a new life in Paris, complete with a gorgeous, rich boyfriend.

David wishes that the paparazzi weren’t obsessed with Jack, snapping pictures of everything he does. He wishes even more that he would stop looking at the pictures, stop analyzing Jack’s expressions and body language, trying to figure out if he is happy or not.

During those first few weeks, David grew accustomed to seeing Jack with his arm wrapped around a different man every time he left a club. He hated it and he was genuinely worried about Jack, but there was nothing he could do.

Then he noticed the dark-haired man who kept showing up in the pictures, not just leaving a club with Jack at 1:00 am. He was also sitting next to Jack sipping espresso in the morning or strolling through the Tuileries in the afternoon.

David’s breaking point came two months ago, when he saw the pictures of Jack and Henri leaving a restaurant after a lunch date, their fingers laced together as they strolled down the street, a genuine smile on Jack’s lips as Henri said something to him. But the caption was the worst part: _Former Gilboan prince, Jack Benjamin, leaving L’ilot with his boyfriend, Henri Durant, son of shipping magnate and millionaire, Alain Durant._

It was obvious that he was Jack’s boyfriend, but until that moment David had never given Henri that label.

David had driven to the airport immediately, frantically searching the departures board for a flight to France. He didn’t know what he’d say or do when he got there, whether he’d punch Jack or kiss him. He’d punch Henri, he knew that much.

And then the thunderstorm had drifted in, darkening the sky, rain angrily pelting the metal roof of the airport.

David had wandered out into the rain, tilted his head up and yelled, “He’s hurting. Jack’s hurting. What am I supposed to do?”

David had never spoken to God like this, but Silas had alluded to it, that he used to talk to God and receive the answer in the thunder.

“He claims he doesn’t love me, but he does. Doesn’t he?” David asked, a genuine question.

“But I love him,” David whispered, dropping his head as rivulets of water streamed from his hair and onto his face. “Even though he abandoned me and didn’t even give us a chance. He just fucking left me even after he promised me he wouldn’t.”

A thunderclap sliced through the sky.

David breathed out sharply and rubbed his hands across his wet cheeks.

“Why?”

Another thunderclap.

“But he’s not happy. You can’t tell me that he actually likes that idiotic Frenchman. He can’t be happy, God, because…”

David had hung his head. _Because I’m not happy._

“Fine,” he whispered, gazing at the coalescing ripples the raindrops made in the puddles under this feet. “I’m sorry that I love them both. I’m sorry, but I do. I don’t know what to do or how to make it better. I never wanted to hurt him, but I promise, as penance, I’ll make Michelle happy, I’ll dedicate—”

The clouds rumbled, cutting off David’s words. The message was clear.

“No,” he yelled. “It isn’t enough for You that Jack is hurting, You want me to hurt Michelle too? You want everyone to be in pain?”

The thunder answered, unequivocal, and David had stopped breathing for a few seconds, filled completely with rage. He’d never been this angry with God before, but God kept asking him to hurt the people he loved.

“No, she’s endured so much. I won’t do that to her. Jack’s gone. She doesn’t need to know about us. You already took Jack from me. I can’t lose her too. And Tamara. I can’t lose Tamara.”

The sky reverberated with a cacophony of rumbles and crashes.

“No!” He had yelled as the clouds lit up like the surface of the Sun and crackled, angry and violent, in response.

David had long had God’s favor and it had made him reckless and arrogant. It made him think he could tell God “no” and that God wouldn’t retaliate. Three weeks after the thunderstorm, Tamara came down with a mysterious illness that no doctor could diagnose.

* * *

David recalls the thunder and God’s anger as he sits in the airport now, realizing that Jack missed his flight.

He finally drags his tired body out of the airport. There is no thunderstorm today, because he doesn’t need it. He knows why God is angry with him. He knows what he has to do.

He drives home in a daze and wanders into the house, immediately trudging upstairs to Tamara’s room.

He sits on the bed and takes her tiny hand in his, so soft and plump, the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen or touched. She is a gift from Heaven and he loves her in a way he could never love anything else. He would do anything for her. He would die for her. For months, he has lied for her.

He’s been selfish and a king isn’t allowed to be selfish. A king isn’t allowed to put himself, his children, or his lovers before his kingdom.

That’s why God is angry.

Tamara’s skin is hot with fever and her breaths are ragged from the fluid in her lungs. She’s sleeping now, but it comes in fits and starts, and she often awakens crying with pain.

She’s been sick for weeks and still the doctors have no idea what ails her. But David knows.

He hadn’t simply tumbled back in to bed with Michelle after Jack left. It had taken a couple months. They hardly knew each other at that point, having spent over a year apart. So much had happened to each of them in the interim. But slowly, they’d found each other again. She was still so sweet and beautiful, and David loved her. He found joy in her body and in her touch, but it was different than it had been before.

Something was missing when he made love to her and no matter how much he denied it, he knew what was missing. He knew what had changed.

Michelle is sitting across from him holding Tamara’s other hand right now. Her eyes are sunken and dark; her hair is frazzled. It’s his fault that she has born this pain. His weakness and his lies have brought the wrath of God upon their child.

“Where’s Jack?” she asks.

“He missed his flight.”

“He didn’t call me. Did he call you?” She never looks up from her daughter’s face.

“No.”

“I’m sorry you drove all of the way to the airport for nothing. He’s always been like this, in his own world. When I was sick, he rarely visited me.”

David knows this of course. He knows Jack better than Michelle can imagine. He knows how Jack avoids situations that involve too much emotion. Not because he’s an asshole, but because he’s more empathetic than anyone realizes. When Jack loves someone, he sucks up that person’s misery like a sponge, feeding his own sorrow until he’s lost in it.

David wonders if Michelle knows this about her brother or if only David knows, because only he ever bothered to gaze that deeply into Jack’s soul.

The thought fills him with a pang of longing. He misses Jack everyday. It’s astounding, actually, given how their relationship began.

David has been physically attracted to Jack from their first meeting, obviously. The man is gorgeous, the way the corners of his mouth curl up when he smiles, the sparkle in his eyes when he says something sarcastic, and the way he looks in uniform…just the thought of it makes David hard.

But Jack’s personality, that had been a different story. David had always liked boys with an edge, but Jack was sharp to the point of complete destruction. He was manipulative, entitled, ornery, and capable of immense cruelty. It took months for David to realize that Jack's cruelty was an armor, shielding a surprisingly gentle heart.

Once David had seen that heart, he became desperate to unearth it. Every time he was allowed to glimpse the beauty underneath Jack's armor felt like a gift, because he knew how infrequently Jack let people see it. It’s like finding the source of the Nile or discovering the golden fleece. Once you find something that unearthly and rare, you don’t simply turn away from it.

He’d even grown to adore the armor that surrounds Jack’s heart, because he understood why it is there. The sarcasm, the rolling eyes, the smirks, even the angry outbursts.

But he hates how it makes Jack run, makes him say horrible things, makes him believe that David doesn’t need him or miss him.

Some days, all David needs is for someone to treat him like he’s just a person, not the man who wears the butterfly crown. He wants someone to look at him and just see David, like Jack did.

That was why he’d hung all of his hopes on Jack’s return, fidgeting like a nervous wreck at the airport waiting for him. He’d denied the obvious fact that Tamara’s illness was a punishment from God. He’d told himself that things would get better once Jack came back. He just needed Jack to come back. Then, he would feel like himself again and he could make everything right. He could make everybody happy. He could find a way to keep all of them, Jack, Michelle and Tamara, because he loves all of them. He needs all of them.

But God is right. He can’t keep any of them with lies.

David just hopes that his revelation isn’t too late, that God will forgive him and save Tamara. Even if Michelle takes her away and David never sees her again, at least she will be alive.

“Michelle.” His voice comes out as a croak from disuse.

“Hmmm?” She doesn’t look up.

“Before you came back to me, I was in a relationship with Jack.”

Her reaction is slow, first her eyelids flutter and then her eyebrows pull down. She breathes in deeply and keeps her gaze on Tamara.

“What do you mean by that?” she whispers.

“A romantic relationship.”

“Physical?”

“Eventually, yes.”

“So, you’re gay too?” She finally looks up and there are no tears, just confusion, in her eyes.

“No, I like both,” David says. “I love both…I love you, Michelle, I do.”

“And Jack?”

“I love him, too.”

“More?”

“Please don’t ask that.”

“Why? That’s not a valid question? That’s the _only_ valid question, isn’t it?”

Her voice is still so quiet and calm. It worries David immensely. She’s always had a sweeter disposition than Jack, who would be yelling and throwing things right now, but she is still a Benjamin.

“It’s not that simple,” David replies.

“But it is. If you could only have me or him, which one would you choose?”

“Who would I _choose_? What kind of question is that? You and Jack are supposed to sit back and let me choose between you, like you’re commodities, not people?”

“It’s just a question and I want an answer. I deserve an answer.”

“I would choose Tamara,” he responds, lightly rubbing her tiny hand between his thumb and forefinger. “God is punishing me for what I’ve done, for how I’ve treated you. I choose Tamara. I repent for everything I’ve done and I pray that God forgives me.”

“She’s sick because of you? Then repent by answering my question. Make it right with God.”

Finally, her voice is sharp as a sword. David takes comfort in the anger.

“I choose Tamara,” he repeats like a broken record.

“You seriously think that’s the truth God wishes you to divulge? If you truly love our daughter, then answer my question,” Michelle says, voice firm. “If it were just me or Jack. Who then?"

David closes his eyes, feels a tear slide down his cheek. He’s failed God and perhaps nothing can save his daughter now, but Michelle deserves the truth. David has always been honest to a fault, not for self-righteous reasons but because he believes that lies unhinge the world, rip families and nations apart.

He believes in truth and that is why he’s never shirked away from it until now, because he has been so terrified that Michelle would take Tamara away from him. So he lied and now God might take Tamara from the world anyway.

But he also lied because Jack left him and took away David’s choice. No matter what answer he gives Michelle now, he’s already lost Jack. On his darker days, he believes Jack’s horrible words. _It was fun being the one to defile you. You were just a fuck. I don’t love you._ He believes that this choice that Michelle is giving him isn’t a choice that he will ever get to make.

But lies have never been in his nature and maybe that’s why, for months, he’s felt like a shell of who he used to be.

 _Jack or Michelle._ He knows which one he would choose, if he could still have him. He’s always known, and he’s been a coward.

“I love you, Michelle. I always will,” David whispers, keeping his eyes closed. “But I love Jack’s soul as if it were my own. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“Please leave,” Michelle whispers after a moment. David doesn’t protest. He simply stands, kisses his daughter’s forehead and steps out.

He calls Jack for the first time since that horrible conversation, the one that still haunts his thoughts.

“This is Jack. If I know you, leave a message. If I don’t, you’ll be hearing from my lawyer for harassing me.”

David smiles, “Jack, it’s David. I’m not trying to bother you or anything. I just wanted to let you know that I had to tell your sister about us, about our night together…I realize that night maybe didn’t mean as much to you as it did to me. And I know it wasn’t my place to tell her. I don’t want to hurt your relationship with her, but I couldn’t keep lying. I just wanted you to know in case she calls you. But I’ll take all of the blame for what happened, because I’m the one who went to your room. I initiated it. I’ll…” David’s voice drops to a whisper. “I hope you’re okay. I miss you everyday. I wish you’d come back to me. I jus wish—“

“End of available space for message,” the automated female voice says. “If you want to leave another message—“

David sighs and hangs up.

* * *

“Why did you not take your mobile wiz you today?” Henri asks when Jack enters their flat.

“I really don’t need a lecture from my sister about how irresponsible I am for missing my flight.”

“Are you going to take anozer flight?”

“No."

“Well, your phone ‘as been pinging all day wiz voice messages.”

Curious, Jack looks at the list.

_Michelle. 5:45 pm_   
_Michelle. 3:12 pm_   
_Michelle. 1:31 pm_   
_Michelle. 6:27 am_   
_David. 4:43 am_

He stares at his phone, immobilized by the last name on the list.

Henri breaks his trance. “If you want to avoid people zat much you could just get a new number, not tell zem what it eez.”

Sometimes Henri has flashes of brilliance, especially in regards to avoiding family members.

Jack smirks, “ _C’est une bonne idée._ ”

Jack taps Michelle’s most recent message.

“Jack. I’m sorry about those earlier messages. I was…very angry when I called. But Tamara is getting better. She’s great actually. It’s a miracle and--“

Jack pauses the message. He can’t handle Michelle’s joy. He doesn’t begrudge her her happiness, but joy is beyond his comprehension right now.

He taps David’s message.

“Jack, it’s David. I’m not trying to bother you or anything. I just wanted to let you know that I had to tell your sister about us, about our night together—”

Jack quickly pauses the message and stares at the phone, seriously considering Henri’s words.

He is surprised that David waited so long to tell Michelle. Jack would have kept it a secret forever, but lying isn’t David’s way. He wonders if David and Michelle will simply call it quits or if they will try to mend their relationship. Either way, Jack wants nothing to do with it.

He sure as hell doesn’t want to get dragged into their “healing process.” And he doesn’t need to be yelled at or be made to explain “his feelings” to anybody. He did his duty to God and left. This isn’t his problem anymore.

With a nod of resolution, he strides past Henri and grabs a hammer from the closet. Henri’s eyes widen with alarm.

“Jack?”

He pauses, looking from the phone to the hammer and decides to tap one last message, do one last good deed. Not for God or Gilboa, not even for David. He does it for his sister.

**_Michelle. I’m so sorry. I never wanted to hurt you. It was just one drunken night and it meant nothing. Please don’t let it stand in the way of your happiness. Love, Jack._ **

He waits for the _whoosh_ signifying delivery of the text message.

He’ll miss Michelle, but she’s intricately woven to David in the fabric of Jack’s mind and he’s tired of how often David still invades his thoughts. He is still tethered to David through Michelle and if he is ever going to be content, he needs to sever that tether.

He places the phone, dark glass and rounded edges, on a tile in the kitchen, and smashes the hammer down as hard as he can.

“Jack!” Henri rushes over, completely confused. He knows that Jack is prone to violent outbursts, but like everyone else in the world, Henri is so addicted to his phone he can’t imagine destroying it on purpose.

The display screen shatters as jagged pieces of glass fly across the room. Jack shields his eyes and then hits the phone again and again and again. The violence is cathartic, but not as much as the shattered remains of his former life strewn across his kitchen floor.

Henri gasps, “We can probably get zee data from zee card. You can probably save zee data.”

Jack giggles and sits next to his destroyed phone.

“Destroying it was the point.”

“But zere must be somezing on zat phone you want.”

Jack shakes his head and surveys the rubble. “No, just some voicemails I don’t want to hear and some old text messages that I don’t need anymore.”

He cancels his old email addresses and gets a new phone number. He avoids news of David and Michelle online. He tries to move on.

Slowly, amazingly, the weight on his chest starts to lift.

* * *

Five months later, the Philistine country of Ekron invades Gath.

Jack catches a flight back to Austeria that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translations (I don't normally like to put other languages in fics, but this will be important later). I've only taken one year of french, so please let me know if any of it seems off:
> 
> _baise-moi maintenant_ : fuck me now  
>  _comme ça. C'est si bon._ : like that. That's so good.  
>  _C’est une bonne idée._ : That's a good idea.


	13. I was a heavy heart to carry

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Title from "Heavy in Your Arms" by Florence + the Machine.

The old code to the gate doesn’t work, so Jack buzzes the intercom. He didn’t tell anyone he was coming back. He wanted the option to bail at any moment.

“Major Benjamin?” It sounds like Adam, one of David’s soldiers, on the intercom.

Jack looks up at the camera mounted on the gate and tries to smile as he’s buzzed in. He hops back into the taxi and they roll onto the driveway of David’s estate in Bozrah.

When Jack turns from the retreating taxi toward the house he sees Michelle standing in the open front door, her eyes wide with surprise, No turning back now.

He drops his bags and trudges up the walkway, giving her a pained smile as she slowly steps down the stairs toward him. They meet in the middle and Jack is sure that she will slap him. He’ll let her. He won’t even say anything snarky in return. He holds his breath, waiting while she regards him with confusion and slight wonder.

Her hair is chin-length and wavy. It makes her look older, in a good way, more like a woman and less like a girl.

Wordlessly, she slides her arms around his chest and pulls him in for a hug. He breathes out, a gasp of astonishment, and closes his eyes. She is so much tinier than him he has to bend down slightly, or he’d simply be hugging her head rather than her shoulders, which seems like a weird way to hug someone, wrapping your arms around the person’s head.

Then he realizes how weird it is that they are even hugging, in part because he had sex with her fiancé, but also because they never used to hug. That’s why he can’t quite figure out how to it, logistically, because she is so much shorter than him. He chuckles at the absurdity of his thoughts, because they’re not even important and probably the product of his overly nervous brain.

What’s important is that Michelle is hugging him.

She pulls back, hands still on the sides of his chest, and smiles up at him. “What?”

“Nothing.” he grins and licks his bottom lip. “I’m just happy that you still want to hug me.”

“You canceled your phone and your email. I considered contacting the Austerian Embassy in Paris and having them track you down.”

“I needed some space.”

“Yeah, I realized that. But I still worried, so I managed to get my hands on Henri’s phone number. I’d call him occasionally just to make sure you were okay.”

“You called Henri? He didn’t tell me about that.”

“I made him promise to keep it a secret. But when I called him last month, he told me you broke up with him. He seemed…not good.”

“Well, he idiotically told me that he loved me,” Jack says with a roll of the eyes. “What else was I supposed to do?”

“Tell him you love him back?” Michelle suggests, shrugging her shoulders.

“Just because I excel at lying doesn’t mean I should do it,” he replies quietly, staring into his sister’s eyes, hoping that she hears everything he is trying to say with that sentence, the apology and the confession.

She steps back and sighs. “David’s out back on the lawn if you want to talk to him.”

He absolutely does _not_ want to talk to him.

“I was worried that you’d leave after you found out, that you wouldn’t still be here with him.” Jack forces the words out like he’s pulling out a splinter. “But I’m glad you are.”

“I thought you just claimed that you shouldn’t lie,” she says with a smirk.

He rubs his hand across his face, shaking his head. “I don’t want to talk to David. That’s not why I came back, Michelle.”

She raises an eyebrow, like she doesn’t believe him and asks, “You’ve come back because of Gath?”

“Ekron invaded Ashdod last year and nobody did anything except worry about it. Now, Gath. You know Gilboa is next.”

“Yeah. David’s been a wreck. His family is still in Gath.”

Jack’s stomach drops to his knees. David didn’t get his family out? Ekron had been posturing for months. Why the fuck didn’t he get his family out?

Michelle must read the emotions in his eyes because she continues, “His mother didn’t want to leave. She’s lived in Prosperity her whole life. By the time he convinced her last month, Gath had closed its borders. And Father hasn’t been letting anyone from Gath enter Gilboa for months, so they were always going to have to leave through Ammon and that’s hundred of miles away.”

“Well, what are you guys doing about it? Anything?”

“Yes, and that’s why I really think you should talk to David. There are things I know he wants to say to you. It’s not my place to say them.”

“Michelle, you don’t have to be nice to me about this. What I did to you – oh God, what I did with your—“

“Jack.” She seems to see that he is spiraling into a loop of guilt and regret, so she places a hand on his shoulder, probably trying to stop him from spinning out of control. “I’ve known you were gay since we were teenagers.”

It’s so unexpected it knocks Jack out of the spiral. “What? How?”

“Come on, I know you. You are good at lying, but not quite as good as you think.”

“But you never said anything.”

“I know. I guess I wanted you to tell me when you were ready. I wanted you to trust me enough to tell me. And I don’t know. I always thought it was wrong to out somebody who is obviously trying to hide it.”

“It is. You did the right thing,” Jack replies, the corner of his lip curling up, touched that she’d grappled with the situation, that she’d wondered what she could do to make it better.

She shakes her head. “No, I didn’t do the right thing. I know what Father is like, especially with you. The things he must have said to you about it, given that he called you a fa— the f-word – in front of everybody. And mother, did she ever say anything?”

“She slapped me, called it a mistake of character,” Jack whispers. He omits how she told him it was a “good thing” that his boyfriend was dead and her possible culpability in that death.

“I fucked up,” Michelle says and Jack jerks, surprised to hear that word come from her mouth, “I knew for years and it never changed how much I loved you and I should have told you that. I think you needed someone to tell you that. I shouldn’t have waited for you to trust me, I should have _showed_ you that you could trust me.”

Jack feels like something warm is radiating inside his chest, something that’s been cold and dead for so long. Something that was still frigid even after he came out of the closet in Paris, because he still didn’t have the approval of the three people who mattered most. He knows what his parents think of him and even though Michelle was the one person in his family who he suspected would accept his homosexuality, he thought he’d lost her love forever by sleeping with David.

“You’re a far better sister than I deserve.”

“That’s true.” There is a sparkle in her eyes. “Jack, you know that Da—“

“Mama,” Tamara wobbles unsteadily out the open front door.

“Wait, honey,” Michelle says, trotting up the stairs and taking her hand. “With mama, always go down stairs with mama, remember.”

Jack notices that Michelle is wearing her ring again, the one that she gave David. The circle of love and promise is apparently complete.

She helps Tamara walk down the stairs, which she masters with relative ease. Jack is shocked, she’s not even two years old. Although he’s never been into babies, so maybe stairs are easy for toddlers. She’s probably the cutest child he’s ever seen, fine hair, delicate features and bright blue eyes. He might be able to like this baby even though he finds most of them annoying.

“Tamara, this is your uncle, Jack. Say ‘hi.’”

Tamara peers at him from behind the safety of Michelle’s legs as Jack bends down.

“It’s nice to meet you,” he says and it truly is. “I’m your mom’s brother. Do you know what that is? A brother? It means that I used to drive your mother crazy and steal all of her stuff—”

Too late he realizes what he’s said, remembers the last thing he tried to steal was David. He looks up quickly but Michelle is still smiling down at them.

“She’s still in the ‘shy’ phase, but she’ll warm up to you. Tambot, did you want a snack?”

“Hungy.” Tamara wraps her arms around Michelle’s leg. “Mama. Hungy.”

“Well, let’s see if we can find you some bananas or cucumbers in the kitchen.”

“Cucumbers?” Jack makes a grossed-out face at Tamara. “You want chocolate. Tell your mom you want chocolate and if she doesn’t give you any, come to me. That’s what uncles are for.”

“Jack,” Michelle cries out, smiling, “you’re not helping.”

He stands up and smirks at his sister. “That’s what brothers are for.”

Michelle’s mouth spreads into a smile so wide that her whole face lights up.

“Go talk to David. He’s been irritable and the rest of us could use a break from that. You’ll be doing us all a favor actually.” She touches his arm. “Find me after. Promise?”

“Promise.”

Jack grabs his suitcases and sets them in the foyer. He takes a moment to breathe in the scent of leather and wood from the antique furniture that came with this estate. This house feels more like home than any other place, even the palace in Shiloh, because only here had Jack felt free. He’d had true friends and no weighty expectations, and he’d had David.

He strolls down the oak hallway, running the tips of his fingers along the bookshelves and steps out the back door.

David is standing in the middle of the lawn, his back to Jack, looking up into the sky.

Jack closes the door and walks down the stone steps, trying to be loud enough to alert David to his presence.

David turns slowly, clearly expecting Michelle or one of his men, and the color drains from his face.

Apparently David Shepherd still stops time, because Jack’s ears start ringing and his vision tunnels and everything else disappears. His hair is slightly longer and somehow blonder than Jack remembers, or maybe that is simply the sunlight’s reflection. He’s wearing a military jacket, unbuttoned at the top with a white t-shirt underneath. It fills Jack with desire. He’s always been a sucker for David in uniform.

David looks slightly ill with surprise and he can’t tear his eyes away from Jack, not even to blink.

“Hello,” Jack says. His voice doesn’t sound like his own.

David opens his mouth and his chest starts to heave like he’s having trouble breathing.

The silence is painful. David doesn’t move or fidget, he just stares.

“I, uh, I came back because of Gath. I figured that you might need help or that I could be useful in some way, especially since your family is…”

He trails off because David is still glowering at him. It’s discomfiting.

“I met Michelle outside. She said I should come talk to you, but if you want me to go?”

“I never realized a month was so long.” David’s voice is cold and devoid of emotion.

“Excuse me?”

“You said you’d be gone a month. I didn’t realize a month was so long.”

“Yeah, I was busy, I couldn’t get—“

“I saw how busy you were.”

Jack sighs. “I didn’t come back to fight. Can we not do this?”

“I know, you came back because of Gath, although I’m surprised you care enough about the future of Gath or Gilboa to come back even for that.”

Jack crosses his arms and glares. Guilt is quickly giving way to annoyance.

“I don’t need this,” Jack says. “I’m a grown man with my own money and no destiny to be king anymore. I can do what I want. I can go where I want.”

“We thought Tamara was going to die and I asked you to come back.”

“I bought a plane ticket—“

“ _Weeks_ after I asked you to.” David’s voice is clipped. He’s teetering on the edge of violence. Jack fully expects this situation to come to blows.

“She seems like she’s doing well. I just met her and she’s—”

“I needed you and you didn’t even care enough about me to come back.”

This isn’t quite what Jack had been expecting. He’d expected David to hug him, maybe tell him he missed him. He didn’t expect to be snapped at, incapable of finishing a sentence without being interrupted. “I called Michelle and she said you—“

“Are you even sorry?”

He’s very sorry, but something about the way David asks it, low and accusatory, causes Jack to fight back for the mere sake of being ornery.

“No.”

“Then you can leave my sight right now.”

Jack should do just that. He probably can’t win this battle, but he can’t make himself turn away either. After living for a year, partially dead on the inside, he’d rather stay on this lawn and fight, just to be near David.

“How dare you,” he says, taking a step toward David. “I left for you and Michelle. I did that _for you_.”

“I didn’t ask you to. As a matter of fact, I recall begging you not to. Repeatedly.”

“What the fuck is it with you people?” Jack cries. “No matter what I do, it’s never good enough. No matter what I give up, I’m always asked to give up more.”

“You weren’t doing me a favor by leaving, so don’t act like you were. You weren’t being strong and selfless, Jack.” David’s mouth is tilted up in anger. “You were being weak.”

David accentuates the word _weak_ like it’s a physical slap to Jack’s face. It feels like a slap.

He opens his mouth, rage coursing through his blood. He has never been weak. David has no fucking right to call him weak, after all of the pain and prejudice he has endured. It reminds him of Joseph’s words on that video recording.

_You’re too brave to be such a coward._

He isn’t a fucking coward and he isn’t weak.

He takes three slow steps toward David and jabs a finger at his chest, “I should fucking punch your face in for that comment.”

David just raises his eyebrow and crosses his arms over his chest, a silent challenge. He seems to be rallying for a fight, completely incapable of his usual calm kindness. It’s as if he’s been waiting months to yell at Jack.

If it’s a fight he wants, Jack is perfectly willing to oblige.

“You’re the weak one, David.”

“Really? How so?”

“You want to be king someday? Well, being king is about sacrifice and yet you’re completely unwilling to make any.”

“I’ve sacrificed plenty. You have no idea what I’ve sacrificed because you are always too busy drowning in your own misery and pushing me away, being a coward.”

“Don’t call me that!” Jack pushes David’s shoulder in frustration, hard enough to unbalance him, causing him to take a step back.

“If not for cowardice, then why did you run away?”

“God told me I had to leave for the future of Gilboa. And I did. I had to be strong because you were being weak.”

“Don’t pawn this off on God. You made the decision to abandon me and everything we’d worked for.”

Jack laughs mirthlessly. “So God talks to you with birds and butterflies and we are all supposed to believe in it. But when He talks to me, it isn’t real?”

“He wanted you to save your sister and my daughter from exile. That didn’t mean that you had to leave.”

Jack can’t believe what he’s hearing, that David so blatantly wants to have his cake and eat it too, although that’s probably God’s fault for favoring David. It’s gone to David’s head.

“You don’t understand because God _gives_ you everything while he _takes_ from the rest of us.”

David shakes his head, opens his mouth to speak, but Jack is finished listening.

“But you’re even worse than Him,” Jack continues. “All you’ve ever done is take from me and still you want more.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” David asks.

“I got on my knees,” Jack sees the widening of David’s eyes and the reddening of his cheeks, “and pledged my loyalty to you. _Me,_ the former crown prince. I saved you from my father’s firing squad, and did I ever get a ‘thank you’? No, I got betrayed.”

“We’ve talked about—“

“I found your child and I brought your queen back to you,” Jack continues, despite David’s interruption, “and still it isn’t enough. I should have stayed by your side for the past year and what? Lounged around in the sitting room with you and Michelle like one big happy family? What the hell did you want from me? I couldn’t fucking stay and you know it.”

“Why not?” David takes a step forward until he’s crowding Jack, but Jack won’t give an inch, not after being called a coward. He stands his ground even though the proximity is messing with his head, making anger and desire collide. “You keep insisting that you don’t love me, so why did it bother you to stay? I mean I’m just a ‘fuck’ to you, right? You’d already had the ‘pleasure of defiling’ me, so why did it even matter to you at that point?”

David pauses, waiting for an answer, and Jack realizes that David has cornered him with his own stupidity, with the disparity between his words and his actions. Jack is certainly acting like a jilted lover and now he doesn’t know how to regain the illusion of indifference.

He waits too long to answer and David’s expression grows smug.

“It’s true that you had every right to leave. It’s your life. You even had the right to fuck every guy in Paris, which it seems you did. But you had no right to lie to me about loving me.”

Jack laughs, a harsh, broken laugh. “I don’t—“

“Stop!” David yells. “Leaving, pushing me away, everything you have done for the past year you did because you care about me, and you just keep _lying_ to me about it.”

“ _Everything_ I did? You’ve certainly acquired the arrogance and self-importance of a king. Looks like you’re ready for the throne.”

“You can’t deflect this, not anymore. I won’t let you. Why do you keep lying about it? Do you seriously enjoy being a miserable martyr that much and making everybody else miserable too?”

“I don’t need this,” Jack mutters, turning and walking up the grass toward the house. He only makes it two steps before David’s hand is wrapping around his shoulder forcefully turning him back around.

“You don’t get to walk away from me again.”

“Don’t!” Jack plants his hands on David’s chest and pushes hard enough that he almost falls. David balls his fists and glares once he regains his footing. He’s breathing hard, probably from anger and in that, they are in tune. Jack would be perfectly willing to settle this with fists.

“Why can’t you just admit that you care about me?” David’s voice is seething. “What is so fucking hard about that?”

“Why are you doing this?” Jack is breathing hard too. “You have Michelle. What does it even matter what I felt? What joy would it bring you to drag the words out of my mouth now?”

Something changes in David’s face, abruptly like a switch has turned on inside of him. He goes from frustrated turmoil to hopeful understanding in one second.

“You think Michelle and I still…?” David’s lips turn up slightly and he takes a step toward Jack, who takes a step back. Jack doesn’t trust the sudden intensity in his eyes. “We broke up five months ago after I told her about you and me.”

Jack glances down at David’s ringless hand and it feels like God has ripped the world out from under his feet. He has no idea what to think or feel, but hope is starting to wax inside of him and it’s overwhelming everything else. “You mean?”

“I thought you knew. After the voicemail I left you, I thought you’d realize. We tried to keep it quiet from the press because it’s better if your father doesn’t know. But I thought you knew.” David sounds so broken and it makes Jack feel horrible.

“David, I never wanted to ruin your relationship with her. I’m sorry.”

“That’s not…” David shakes his head in frustration and licks his lips. “I knew what I was doing when I went to your room that night. I knew what I was risking, and I did it anyway, because I wanted you more. Did you never realize that?”

Jack just shakes his head, too surprised to answer.

“Oh. Well, that explains a lot actually,” David says, rolling his eyes and shaking his head. He cracks his knuckles and rubs the bridge of his nose, coming down from the high of anger. “And I probably share some of the blame, I guess. Maybe I never told you that.”

Jack is still a swirling, confusing mess of emotions he can’t identify. He thinks if he opens his mouth, he’ll just end up saying something stupid, so he simply wraps his arms around his chest, a poor armor but the only one he has, and stares at David.

David returns the stare for a few moments, obviously wanting something from Jack, words that Jack doesn’t know how to find or some emotion that Jack isn’t even sure he feels.

So he does nothing and eventually David sighs and says, “You know how there are some people you connect with immediately, like I did with Michelle, and there are others you don’t even like at first, but then they kind of grow on you?”

“Like a disease?” Jack asks with an attempt at a smirk. His voice is light even though his arms are still wrapped around his chest defensively.

David raises his eyebrows and breathes out, nodding slightly as he steps toward Jack. “Yeah. Exactly like a disease. It hurts like a disease sometimes, especially when this hypothetical person runs off to Paris to fuck every man he can get his hands on.”

“Despite what you think, I wasn’t trying to hurt you. I just needed...” Jack trails off because he doesn’t know how to say _I needed to wash away the memory of your touch and I didn’t know how._

“I know. But seeing those pictures of you with all of those men. You have no idea how many times I wanted to fly to Paris and punch you.”

“You did?” It shouldn’t make Jack happy to hear that David possesses the same darkness that he does, the same need to lash out and hurt the things he loves. But it’s refreshing to see a glimmer of true bitterness underneath all of the altruism.

Maybe they aren’t so different.

Maybe David isn’t the glittering dots of starlight and Jack isn’t the blanket of darkness, the void that nobody notices next to the brilliance of the stars. Maybe both of their natures are more impermanent than that and sometimes David is the darkness and he needs Jack to be his light.

“I’m not proud of those moments, but of course I was angry.” David seems exasperated that Jack finds this surprising. “I mean I _tried_ to be selfless. I _tried_ to hope that you were happy with Henri.”

The way David says it makes it obvious that he tried and failed.

“You knew about Henri?” Jack asks.

“You dated him for eight months. Of course I knew. I didn’t worry about the other men, even though I knew what you were doing with them and if I let myself think about it…” David closes his eyes and clenches his fist, taking a few seconds to regain control over the memory of pain. “But Henri, he stuck around too long and I thought maybe…you loved him.”

“I didn’t.”

“Good. He wasn’t good enough for you.”

“You didn’t even know him.”

“I could tell.”

Jack smiles and looks down at his hands, clasped together in front of him, and decides to be brave. He’s never said what he’s about to say to a man, not even Eli or Joseph. Not because he didn’t feel it, but because he’s always been completely afraid to admit it. He’s always thought that the moment he said those three little words would be the moment he lost all of his power in the relationship. And in every relationship, power has always been his priority.

He looks up at David and says, “I do love you.”

“Really?” David asks, his words laced with disbelief and longing. He takes a step forward and runs his fingers along the exposed skin of Jack’s forearm.

A shiver runs through Jack. He breathes in the scent of David, soap and grass. All of the hurt and pain of the past year flows out of his body and into the ground, lost. “Of course, look at you. You’re fucking perfect.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Damn close,” Jack says with a tilt of his lips.

David lightly rubs his knuckles along Jack’s cheek. It makes all of the tension drain out of his body. It’s the most amazing thing he’s felt in a year, that simple touch.

“Say it again,” David whispers with a smile, the first genuine smile that has graced his face during this conversation. Jack almost forgot how brilliant he looks when he smiles, the way his eyes become mere slits and the dimples, Jack had almost forgotten the dimples. He wants to keep that look on David’s face forever.

“I love you.”

It’s oddly liberating, admitting that he loves David. It feels like he’s been falling and finally someone caught him.

“I love you too, you fool,” David whispers and kisses him lightly, no heat, no hunger, just one soul kissing another. Pure and complete.

David drags him into a hug and they simply stand there, rocking slightly back and forth. It’s been a long time but Jack has finally come home, and he’s never felt so free or so safe in his entire life.


	14. You came to me like wine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from "Two Step" by Dave Matthews Band.
> 
> I checked the french in this chapter with an online instructor, so I think it is right. I hope it is.
> 
> Trigger warning: possessive behavior.

David herds him into his Volvo and drives into downtown Bozrah. Jack should ask about Ekron’s invasion of Gath, what Tamara’s first words were, anything, but he simply stares at David, unable to comprehend the turn of events. David pulls into the Melakhim Hotel, one of the luxury hotels in the city.

Jack whistles, “Impressive, Mr. Shepherd, I thought you grew up in a simple country house?”

“Well,” David pulls the parking break as the valet walks toward their car, “My boyfriend’s a bit fancy. Gotta keep him in the lap of luxury.”

Jack can’t contain the smile or the butterflies that spring forth at that one word, _boyfriend._

He’s laughing and giddy as he follows David into the lobby, complete with a marble fountain, just like a mini palace. It’s nearly impossible to keep his hands off of David as they ride the elevator with an elderly couple. The woman keeps looking at Jack, trying to act like she isn’t.

“Aren’t you—“ she finally asks.

The elevator dings and the doors open to their floor, “Nope,” Jack replies, bounding into the hallway after David.

The minute David closes the door to their suite, Jack pounces on him, ripping at his shirt, tongue getting tied up from kissing him a bit too emphatically.

Within seconds they’ve stripped and fallen onto the bed. It’s fast and passionate, over a year of pain and frustration making it less an act of love and more an act of desperation. Jack wants to touch every part of David’s body, memorize all of the details that he’d forgotten during the separation, the swell of his ass, the hard lines of his stomach, the scar on his thigh that he got falling off of a tractor when he was a child.

Jack preps himself quickly and frantically while David straddles him, sucking marks into his neck.

“Need you now,” Jack says and David responds wordlessly, thrusting his cock in to the hilt.

A litany of pleas are flowing off of Jack’s tongue as David rolls his hips quickly, his cock inexorable as it pounds into Jack, roughly taking what Jack would give freely. Jack is lost in it, no idea how much time passes or what he is saying as the words stream out of his mouth unbidden.

David stops thrusting so abruptly that Jack feels a ripple pulse through his entire body at the loss of the sensation. He opens his eyes to find David glaring down at him, his eyes filled with confusion.

“David,” Jack says, completely confused, “What’s wrong?”

“You just spoke French,” he mutters.

Jack looks away, scanning his memory for the string of words he’d just been saying.

_Yes, Fuck yes. Right there. Oui. Ta bite…si bon. Oui._

“I lived in France for a year, sometimes French comes out.”

David starts to pull away. Jack quickly wraps his legs around David’s thighs and buttocks, trapping him, keeping them joined.

“David?”

“Who were you thinking about?”

 _Who?_ Jack laughs at the pure absurdity of it, which only seems to piss David off more.

“You.”

David is still glaring, so Jack grabs the back of his head and pulls him into a kiss, trying to communicate his passion and need. David kisses him back, but it’s bitter and hollow, still seething with jealousy.

“All I said was that your cock is great,” Jack whispers.

He grabs David’s ass and rolls his hips upward, making David groan as his cock slides deeper into Jack. He repeats the motion again and again.

“Come on, baby, come back to me,” Jack murmurs as he continues to roll his hips, driving David’s cock in and out for him.

Like a stretched tether, David’s jealousy snaps and he traps Jack’s hands above his head, pounding him with a possessiveness he’s never expressed before, a possessiveness Jack thought him incapable of feeling.

“You abandoned me,” David says while he continues to thrust himself into Jack, “You went where I couldn’t follow. Never again.”

Jack gasps at the sudden change in David’s motions, unable to form words through the haze of rough pleasure.

David tightens his grip on Jack’s hands, “Never again.”

“Never again,” Jack repeats.

David flips him unceremoniously onto his belly and takes him from behind.

“You’re mine,” David says.

“I’m yours…please…oh God, right there.”

He can barely form words, but he knows that David needs to hear them, so he tries to pay attention and respond, even though he’s completely lost in the feeling of David inside of him, stretching him. He feels so full, like they are one.

David pushes his body into the blankets with one hand, the other gripping Jack’s hip as he plows into him.

“Mine,” he gasps through his stuttering breaths.

“Yes,” Jack responds in a haze of bliss. His body is on fire, tingling and shivering with need. It’s rough and raw and inexactly what Jack needs after the year of pain, after their fight on the lawn.

David flips him again so they are facing each other, Jack on his back, and pushes his cock into him. He keeps himself buried deep inside of Jack, completely still as he takes Jack’s face in his hands, a pained expression in his eyes, “I need you with me.”

“Yes. I know,” Jack says.

“I couldn’t follow you. You pushed me away and I couldn’t follow. You can’t go where I can’t follow.”

“I promise I’ll never do it again,” Jack whispers, “Nothing can take me from you, I swear.”

David grips Jack’s hips hard and starts pounding into him again, rough and needy, “I need you with me.”

“ _Toujours,_ always.” Jack responds, panting from the force of David’s thrusts. He stares into David’s eyes, trying to reclaim the moment, the words, show him that no matter the language David owns his heart, “ _J’ai envie de toi._ ”

“What?” David asks, but the anger is waning and he simply wants to understand the words now.

“I want you.”

“More,” David demands, tilting his head back, his mouth falling open at he loses himself in Jack’s body.

“ _Tu es mon coeur, _”__ Jack knows that David doesn’t understand the words but he finally understands that they are for him and no one else, “ _Sans toi je suis perdu. Tu es tout pour moi._ ”

He says things he isn’t yet brave enough to say in English because they’d sound too cheesy. _You are my heart. I’m lost without you. You are everything to me._

“Fuck,” David gasps, filled only with desire now, not anger, “God, you feel so fucking good.”

Jack whimpers in response, lost in the need that is rippling through his body, but also from the odd joy of being possessed so completely. There’s a comfort in David’s jealous anger, in the fact that Jack can hurt him as much as he can hurt Jack.

There’s a symmetry to them that Jack has never had with any other man.

David bends down, sucking and biting Jack’s neck and shoulder, still pounding him without mercy, without finesse. Jack grabs his hair and pulls hard in retribution, making David cry out and smile down at Jack, eyes blazing with desire.

He reaches down and pumps Jack’s cock in time with his thrusts. Suddenly, it is all too much and Jack loses it without warning, spilling all over his belly.

“Yeah, come for me,” David gasps.

Then he’s pounding Jack wordlessly, hips stuttering as he follows him over the edge.

* * * * * * * * * *

Afterward, David cleans him up, loving and gentle.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers.

“Hmmm?”

“I was mean. The way I made love to you was mean and I’m sorry.”

Jack’s lips tilt up in a lazy smile, “Come here.”

He drags David down so that he’s curled around Jack’s body, his head resting on Jack’s shoulder. Jack can’t believe the difference 24 hours can make. This time yesterday he was on a plane, trying to figure out how he was going to act like he was fine being around David and Michelle, now he’s lying in a bed with David naked beside him.

“You don’t have to do that, David.”

“Do what?” David is lazily drawing patterns on Jack’s chest with his fingers, the previous rage gone.

“Be ashamed of emotions you think are beneath you. You can be jealous and angry and frustrated around me. You don’t have to always be the paragon of understanding. Not with me. You can be whoever you want to be with me.”

When David looks up at Jack with a mixture of joy and gratitude, Jack wonders if he’s the first person who has ever said that to him. The burden of morality must be hard to bear.

“I know,” David murmurs, “But it shouldn’t come out in the bedroom.”

“That’s exactly where it should come out,” Jack replies. He still has so much he wants to show David about sex, “Fighting is best done in bed, otherwise it’s just fighting.”

“Noted,” David says, kissing him lazily, “You should feel free to show me all of the emotions you’re ashamed of, too, like joy, kindness, selflessness.”

Jack would be offended but he knows it’s a joke and David’s face is lit up with so much sarcastic laughter it’s impossible to feel anything but bliss. Jack can’t believe that he’s found his way back into David’s arms and that David still loves him enough to look at him like that.

“I promise I won’t tell anyone about how beautiful your heart is, Jack. How deep down inside, you’re more of a hopeless romantic than me.”

“Shut it,” Jack replies, playfully slapping his ass, “Don’t make me punish you.”

David’s face instantly turns serious and lusty. He rolls onto Jack, pinning his arms above his head again and grinding his cock against Jack’s, “I’m the one who does the punishing.”

His voice is dark, filled with a promise that he hasn’t yet forgiven Jack for all of the boys in France or for claiming that David meant nothing to him. Jack’s dick amazingly tries to rally for another go as David kisses him possessively, leaving him breathless and claimed.

David rolls off of him and grabs the room service menu from the end table, “I’m famished. Let’s order dinner.”

* * * * * * * * * *

David orders enough food for four people and then proceeds to eat most of it. His table manners are atrocious, shoving the next piece of food into his mouth before he’s swallowed the previous morsel, elbows on the table as his leans toward Jack.

He’s adorable.

“When are you going to Gath?” Jack asks.

“I’m not going to Gath.”

“Then where…?”

“Gilboa.”

“Wha—?” Jack is too stunned to speak. He really should have asked about this on the drive.

“The men are headed to Gath, but I’m headed to Shiloh tomorrow.”

“You promised Silas you wouldn’t return. He’ll kill you.”

“Given the situation, I can do more good by going to Shiloh. Austeria still hasn’t declared war on Ekron, but they will offer military support to Gilboa if it chooses to fight. Austeria isn’t really in any immediate danger, but Gilboa is and your father has to know that. I’m going to Shiloh to convince King Silas that he needs to let the 30,000 refugees from Prosperity back into his country, including my family. Your father needs to help them and he needs to accept military support from Austeria.”

“Who’s going? How?” Jack still can’t seem to piece a coherent thought together.

“Me, the Austerian Secretary of State and three of her staff…and Michelle and Tamara.”

“What the fuck?”

“We’ve already scheduled the Secretary’s official plane.”

“My father is going to kill you. You’ve gone completely crazy.”

“It wasn’t my idea. It was Michelle’s.”

“Am I in some parallel universe in which people behave in the most ridiculous ways imaginable? This is the dumbest…what the fuck went wrong in all of your heads?”

“Just hear me out. Can you do that?” Jack nods, mostly because he’s still having a difficult time putting his thoughts together beyond incredulous spluttering, “I agreed with you when Michelle came up with this plan, but then she presented her case and won me over.”

“And?”

“As Michelle pointed out, your father is most unpredictable and deadly when he’s cornered. He lashes out like a caged dog. But, when he thinks he holds all of the cards, when he thinks he has all of the power, it’s goes to his head and he gets lazy. He gets careless.”

“But my father’s still an asshole when he’s careless. He’ll still kill you on the spot.”

“I don’t believe he will and that’s enough for me.”

“Why? Did God tell you that?”

“No.”

“David, you can’t, you just—“

“Jack, my mother, my brothers, they are stuck in Corinth right now with 30,000 other refugees from the disputed zone. They are desperate to get across the river, but your father won’t let them. Ekron forces are already occupying Port Prosperity and New Hope, marching toward them. The things I’ve heard, Ekron soldiers killing without mercy. I have to do this. You can’t talk me out of it. It’s my family.”

Jack feels hopeless, “David, but…please.”

“Come with me,” David says, “I need you, always with me. I’m stronger with you by my side, and we need you. If Silas gets you too, then he’ll have everyone he cares about. With you, this might work.”

“He doesn’t care about me.”

“How can you say that? He loves you more than almost anything. It’s why he cut you out of his life, tried to hurt you, because when you sided with me he felt betrayed beyond reason. The way he completely lost his cool when you defended me at the trial, he forgot about his image, about the cameras, and showed his true colors, because he was genuinely hurt…It’s your choice, of course, but I want you there.”

Jack thinks back to the promise he made to himself watching David in Bethel with a living crown and a trail of butterflies. _I’d follow him anywhere, battle, exile, even death._

It seems he’s about to get his wish. Silence stretches and David simply stares at Jack, waiting, hopeful.

“You know melakhim means ‘kings’ in the old language,” Jack mutters.

“What?”

“The name of this hotel, Melakhim…it means ‘kings,’” Jack replies, “I’m with you, always. No more self-imposed exile, no more hiding. Silas has had the luxury of ruling for too long and squandered it and I’m done waiting for the world to be made better. I’m done waiting for Gilboa to finally have the king she deserves. So, I’m with you in this, no matter whether we die or Silas does, I’m with you.”

“Jack, if you are talking about killing your father, I…we can’t. I just want to inspire him to do what’s right for Gath and I can’t do that from here.”

“If it comes to that, _we_ won’t have to kill him, _I will._ ”

“No,” David reaches across the table convulsively grabbing Jack’s hand, “No, you will not have that on your conscience. That isn’t the plan and even if it were, I wouldn’t let you. You will not taint your soul with that, so stop talking like that.”

“I failed you in Bethel.”

“That was hardly a failure.”

“I could have killed him then. I had a clean shot and instead I let him walk straight up to me and take the gun from my hands.”

David sighs in frustration and comes around the table to kneel beside Jack, taking Jack’s hands in his.

“I have never asked nor wanted you to commit patricide for me. The fact that you still love your father—“

Jack lets out a strangled noise, a mixture of hurt and embarrassment…because he does love his father.

“Jack, the fact that you still love him, despite all of this, is one of the reasons I love you. He’s your family. He’s treated you like complete shit, but he is your family and you love him…and that’s okay. You have every right to still love him.”

“Do you know what he did to me after I defended you in court?” Jack’s voice is quiet and his eyes downcast. David knows about Silas’ cruelty, but he doesn’t know the depths.

David shakes his head and tightens his grip on Jack’s hands.

“In front of Mom and Michelle and Lucinda and a couple servants, he told me to get on my knees and kiss the ground he walked on. He’s king, I guess that was his right, but when I hesitated he leaned in and told me that my mouth had been in dirtier places.’”

Silence unspools between them and Jack can hear the way David’s breathing hitches and then deepens, can feel the way his fingers twitch and then start stroking the back of Jack’s hand, but Jack can’t look up. He doesn’t want to see disgust in David’s eyes.

“I’ll kill him,” David whispers with such conviction Jack doesn’t even question that he means it, “If the time comes and we have to, if it’s between you and him, I’ll kill him. But you won’t. I won’t let you…But let’s pray it doesn’t come to that, okay? Let's make sure it doesn't come to that.”

“We should go back to the estate,” Jack replies, because he doesn’t know what else to say to David’s earnest promise, “As much I want to stay here and make love to you and forget that the rest of the world exists, we should go back. There is too much to prepare if we are leaving tomorrow morning. We have to go back.”

“I paid for the night. This place doesn’t really rent by the hour.”

Jack smirks, but there’s still a sadness he can’t shake, “You used my credit card. I paid for the night.”

“Jack, while you were gone I dreamed about making love to you, of having you inside of me. I wondered what it would feel like.”

Jack’s body thrums with desire. All it takes are a few words from David and he’s lost in need, willing to throw everything else in his life away for one simple touch, for one night.

“If we are to die tomorrow or the next day, I’m not dying without knowing how you feel inside of me, Jack. Stay, at least for a few more hours. Give me that. Then we can remember that there is a world out there that needs us. But, please, give me a few more hours to forget about all of that, and just be here with me, like we are the only people in the world.”

Jack almost laughs at the worry and longing on David’s face. If David thinks that Jack could ever say “no” to those words, then he’s an idiot.

He leans forward and kisses David tentatively, sweetly. Where they had been hard and fast and angry before, Jack intends to be nothing but calm and patience now. David’s never done this and although he openly desires it, he has no idea what he’s asking for. A man’s first time should never be rushed or hardened by the edges of anger. If they are to do this, it will be perfect for David. He deserves no less.

So when David deepens the kiss, Jack allows it, but when his fingers dig into Jack’s forearm a bit too forcefully, Jack leans away.

“Not like that,” Jack says quietly, “If you are still angry at me, I understand, but I’m not making love to you like that.”

“That wasn’t anger, just need,” David walks slowly toward the bed, removing his t-shirt and boxers and extending his hand to Jack in invitation, “I trust you.”

Jack strips and follows, anticipation and longing humming through his skin. He pushes David onto his back and straddles his naked body, kissing every part of him lightly and lovingly, building David’s hunger slowly, as if it is something delicate and fragile that needs to be protected. He doesn’t let David take control even though he obviously wants to, pleading with Jack to just do it already.

David likes to be in control. It’s odd actually. He'd seemed so polite and easily molded when Jack first met him. He’d only known David a few days when he'd first masturbated to the thought of tarnishing him, pushing him to his knees and shoving his cock down David’s throat. He’d wanted to use him, break him, and then move on to the next boy.

That was before he knew David, before he realized that he is not so easily broken. Now those early fantasies seem as odd as wanting to push Lucinda to her knees and take her. He still wants David on his knees, still remembers that blowjob a year ago and how beautiful David looked, his lips flushed and stretched around Jack’s cock.

But when he dreams of David’s lips on his dick now, it isn’t an act of degradation but an act of reverence.

He wants to bask in David’s light. He wants to make love to him, worship him and cherish him like God intended. Silas was wrong. This isn’t a perversion. This is beautiful and holy.

Jack takes his time until David is panting with need, before pushing a very well-lubed finger into him and watching him shudder around it.

“Yes,” David gasps. His head is thrown back and his eyes are closed. He pushes back against Jack and begs for two fingers, but Jack doesn’t give it until he thinks David is ready, waiting until David relaxes completely before giving him more.

Watching David moan and writhe and whisper his name like a benediction, Jack could probably come right now from one simple touch, so he resists the urge to take himself in his hand. This isn’t about him.

When he finally pushes three fingers in, David tenses slightly. He obviously hasn’t gone this far with himself.

“Just relax, baby,” Jack murmurs, planting light kisses on David’s thighs and keeping his fingers perfectly still, “I got you. I won’t hurt you. Just relax.”

David stares at him, his pupils large and black with desire, pushing away the beautiful sky blue until it is but a thin orb encircling the darkness. He takes a few deep breaths and relaxes, moaning with hunger rather than pain when Jack starts to move his fingers again.

David whimpers at the loss when Jack pulls his fingers away and lies on his back next to David. He doesn’t skimp with the lube that he rubs onto his dick.

“You should be on top, in control,” Jack says, dragging David’s body onto his. He’s shaking slightly with desire, which means he’s as ready as Jack can make him, but it is still a world of difference taking a cock compared to fingers.

“You go at your pace,” Jack says, positioning himself, but making no move to thrust, “Stop and wait for yourself to adjust. Or if it’s too much, you can stop entirely. You don’t have to continue for me. You understand?”

“You act like I’m china. Like I’ll break.”

“I just want it to be perfect for you,” Jack whispers, “That’s all.”

David slides down onto the head of Jack’s cock and stops, his face scrunched with surprise and desire and just a tiny bit of pain.

It really is nothing like fingers.

He looks so beautiful, biting his lips and panting slightly, that it takes all of Jack’s willpower not to thrust. He calms his breathing and simply lies there watching, running his hands reassuringly along David’s hips.

Slowly, _painfully_ slowly, David slides down, stopping once before Jack is completely inside of him. Jack’s head is pounding with the need to move his hips. He doesn’t.

“So…full,” David whispers, not moving.

“You look so fucking beautiful,” Jack replies, “Like an Adonis. I can’t believe you chose me.”

“I can’t believe you chose me.”

The distraction of words helps David relax and he rises and pushes back down experimentally. Jack digs his fingers into David’s hips. He feels like he’s fighting a hurricane of desire inside of himself, having to resist thrusting his hips upward.

David tries again and this time he groans with pleasure. He rises immediately and thrusts back down, finding a slow rhythm, way too slow, but at least he’s moving, so Jack finds joy in the simple things.

After a few moments, David is riding him, his hands clasped on Jack’s chest, his eyes burning holes into Jack’s, holding his gaze and not letting him look away. David finally seems relaxed enough that Jack thrusts for the first time, angling himself forward and causing David to cry out and tilt his head back. He starts riding Jack harder, growing frustrated when it isn’t enough. It’s the moment Jack has been waiting for. He grasps David’s hips firmly, holding him in place and pushes his cock into him, taking control.

David is a panting mess of need, murmuring Jack’s name over and over. Jack rolls him over, so David’s on his back and pushes his legs apart, thrusting into him. He’s not rough, David still isn’t ready for that, but the rhythm isn’t so painfully slow now.

David arches and cries out Jack’s name and it’s suddenly too much. Despite all of Jack’s experience, all of those years of learning how to have stamina and keep going, he loses all of it in a wave of bliss, because he is inside David Shepherd…golden, beautiful and panting his name.

Jack cries out and releases, shaking and moaning and losing all sense of the world outside of David, outside of how hot and tight and wonderful he feels.

When he starts to come back down from the high, he feels like a jerk. David hasn’t come and this was supposed to be about him.

David is just smiling, eyes hazy like he’s drunk.

“Shit, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to come.”

David actually laughs, “Really? I thought that was kind of the point of this.”

“After,” Jack pulls himself out, “After you.”

“I’m close,” David reaches up and brushes a finger across Jack’s bottom lip, “And there are plenty of other ways to get off.”

David’s still open and relaxed, so Jack’s slips two fingers into him as he slides his mouth all of the way down David’s cock.

“Holy fuck,” David cries out, bucking and shaking. He’s right, there are plenty of ways to get off. Jack curls his fingers, rubbing David from the inside while sucking him. David is writhing so much Jack has a hard time maintaining the rhythm.

He’s also acquired the language of a sailor. _Fuck, Jack…fuck yes…you are so fucking hot…suck it…God yes._

Jack can feel it building in the way David’s body tenses, hear it in the way his words become gasps. He tightens around Jack’s fingers as his body begins to shake and he empties himself into Jack’s mouth. He tastes musky and slightly salty and Jack fucking loves it. Wishes he could do it all over again immediately.

David pulls Jack up to lie beside him, not allowing him to grab a towel to clean David up.

“We’ll take a shower in a minute, just lay here with me, will you?”

David Shepherd always has to be in control, but Jack doesn’t complain, he pulls the sheets over them and curls against David.

“That was…different than I expected,” David says, his chest rumbling slightly under Jack’s cheek.

“Good different?”

“Yeah, but how the hell do you do it so easily? When we got here, you took, like 30 seconds, preparing yourself and then we did it. That had to hurt.”

Jack secretly loves it, that David is so inexperienced. He likes being the one to teach David, to expand his world.

“It didn’t.”

“It _had_ to.”

Jack chuckles, “The first time, no matter how much you try to relax, your body still tenses because it isn’t used to things going up there.”

“Yeah, I could tell.”

“But it got better, right? You liked it after a few minutes.”

“Yeah, at first it was kind of painful with an undercurrent of pleasure, but then it was just…good, really good. I felt full and amazing.”

“My body doesn’t tense up anymore, so it’s easy now. Give it a few more times, you might understand.”

The minute Jack says it he’s struck with the pain of it, planning for a future that might not exist. This might be the only night he gets with David. And now, all of the anger seems so petty, running away to France and pushing David away even after he’d begged Jack to stay. They might only ever have two nights together, with an ocean of pain in between them.

Jack wraps his arm around David and squeezes, wishing they weren’t separated by these layers of skin. He wishes they could truly be one in flesh like they are in spirit.

David pulls back slightly, so he’s looking Jack in the eyes, “How old were you, the first time you did that?”

“You really want to talk about my ex-boyfriends?”

“So, it was with a boyfriend?”

Jack takes that as a “yes,” David does want to talk about it.

“I was nineteen. His name was Eli.”

“Did you love him?”

Of course that is the first question David would ask, “Yeah, in that teenage way.”

“’Teenage way’?”

“You know, all consuming, you think you’ll die without it. But when you look back on it, you realize how doomed it was from the beginning. Like it’s an inferno, so it’s bound to burn itself out.”

“I know what you mean. So, did you like it the first time you did it?”

“God no,” Jack replies with a chuckle, watching the surprise unfurl on David’s face, “We were kids and we didn’t know what we were doing and I was nowhere near ready or relaxed enough and it hurt. I mean, I could tell that there was pleasure underneath the pain, but…it mostly hurt.”

“What happened to Eli?”

“We broke up, I was devastated at the time. He lives in Gilead now, as far as I know.”

“So he wasn’t the one who died?”

David must see the transformation in Jack’s face, how the nostalgia slips into pain, because he takes the question back almost immediately.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked.”

Jack pauses, considers getting up and showering, not replying, then his mouth starts moving without his consent, “His name was Joseph.”

David doesn’t reply. He seems to have mastered the art of dragging secrets and honesty out of Jack. He doesn’t prod, he simply let’s Jack find the path on his own.

“He was…sweet, too nice for me. I destroyed him. He was an artist, not that he made any money at that. He was going to law school, but he’d always loved to paint. It’s what he wanted to do. I never suspected that my father knew about…my preferences. But right after you rescued me when I was taken hostage, my father approached me about it. And so, I broke up with Joseph, tried to cut him out of my heart. But then I fucked up the night the lights went out. I should have just stayed away from him, but…I was sitting on these steps next to this lady. I was hiding from my family. When I realized that she knew who I was, I started to leave and she said, ‘I won’t tell anyone. You don’t have to be him tonight. The lights are out. You can be anyone you want.’ So, I found Joseph. It was the last time I was ever with him.”

“The night the lights went out?” David whispers. He sounds haunted and troubled. It was the night he spent with Michelle, the night Tamara was conceived, but he had no way of knowing that that night also held a profound meaning to Jack. “You were still with him when I met you?”

“Yeah.”

“That night, when you took me out to the clubs, you seemed so happy, and then all of a sudden you were beating people up. Did something happen that night?”

“Yeah. Joseph knew the drill, that I had to go out and dance with women, kiss women. Then I’d find him afterward. But that night I told him to ‘get lost.’ I had him thrown out of the club. He looked like a broken puppy lying on the sidewalk. I did that for my father. I turned away from Joseph and went back into the club for my father. So, yeah, I started beating people up.”

“Then when did he…?

_Die._

“You were on ‘a pilgrimage’ with my father.”

“Meeting your half-brother, you mean?”

“Since ‘pilgrimage’ is apparently my father’s code for seeing his secret fucking family, yes.”

“I wish we hadn’t still been idiots with each other back then, constantly at odds,” David says, “I wish I’d known what you were going through. Maybe I could have done something.”

“It’s in the past. It doesn’t matter.”

“It matters,” David hugs Jack tighter against his chest and plants a soft kiss on his forehead.

“So does the future, and I pray we have one,” Jack murmurs, his cheek resting on David’s shoulder as he caresses his chest. It is easier to divulge his feelings this way, touching but not looking.

“Given what we are about to do tomorrow, I can’t promise that you won’t lose me,” David murmurs, low like he’s telling Jack a secret and he doesn’t want the world to hear, “But I can promise that you will only ever lose me to death. Jack, as long as you’ll have me, I’m yours.”

Jack can feel the way David’s chest rises and falls under his hand, the warmth and softness of his flesh, a home that he never expected to be welcomed back into, “You’ll regret those words in 40 years when I’m still devastatingly handsome, but old and cranky and even more of a pain in your ass than I am now.”

David chuckles, glowing and happy, taking pleasure in the moment before it’s lost, “I hope so, Jack. I hope so.”

They stay there for almost an hour, holding each other, acting as if time isn’t still flowing forward, that they can stay here forever just like this.

But then David starts to shiver slightly because the room is too cold and Jack has to pee, and the moment falls apart.

They have to leave this hotel, this haven, and return to the real world.

Jack can see the resolve on David’s face as he pulls him up and drags him into the shower. It’s time to go home.


	15. We live in a beautiful world

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from "Don't Panic" by Coldplay.

David calls ahead to tell Ezra Mason that he and Jack are headed home that evening. So, Ezra is waiting on the front steps of the estate with a huge grin, despite the fact that they might be marching to their deaths tomorrow.

He wraps Jack in a friendly hug, momentarily forgetting propriety. “We didn’t expect you guys until tomorrow morning.”

“Really?” Jack tenses under Ezra’s grasp. Years of keeping his sexuality a secret and in less than a day, he’s tarnished David’s reputation. They were so stupid, heading to a hotel like long-separated lovers. If they survive the mission, if – when – David is crowned king, they can’t have any stupid indiscretions like this one.

Ezra senses Jack’s discomfort and quickly lets him go.

“Sorry, sir, that hug was out of line. It’s just great to see you.”

David is watching the entire exchange with an odd smile. Can’t he see that they are teetering on the edge of complete destruction? Everyone will think that David is gay too, and his chances of ever being king will dissolve into the aether.

“Mason.” Jack tries to sound calm. “Did you see the pictures of me in France?”

David’s smile only grows and Jack can’t even look at him. What the fuck is wrong with him? This isn’t funny. This is a disaster.

“Uh, yes.” Ezra’s entire posture changes to uncomfortable. “Why?”

“Captain Shepherd and I just needed to discuss the upcoming mission, that’s all we were doing.”

Ezra furrows his brow while David’s smile becomes a full-fledged grin.

“Okay?” Ezra replies, completely confused. “I wasn’t…I…”

“In all honesty, I don’t recall talking about the mission all that much, Jack,” David smirks, the innuendo so obvious Jack wants to slap him.

“He was also giving me a debrief on the past year,” Jack says, desperately trying to save the situation. “I’d been gone a long time and David needed to fill me in.”

David chuckles, causing Jack to hear the double meaning in his statement. Jack glares, silently pleading with David to stop, and David winks, actually winks, in response.

“Sir,” Ezra says uncomfortably, “permission to speak freely.”

Jack raises his eyebrow, still staring at David. “Granted.”

“Jacob and I, we actually thought you and Captain Shepherd were together before you went to France. We were happy for you two.”

“Well, we weren’t together,” Jack says, his voice low and annoyed. “We _aren’t_ together.”

“Really?” David replies, still smiling. “We aren’t together?”

“David!” Jack hisses, like he’s a parent reprimanding a child. “I will not discuss this in front of other people.”

They can still save David’s reputation even though his is destroyed. They just need to be careful in the future, the epitome of discrete, and a fake girlfriend for David wouldn’t hurt.

“Jack,” David responds, elongating the vowel almost like he is singing Jack’s name, “you’re right. This is a private matter, but it will _never_ be a secret.”

Jack tilts his head, eyes blazing with disbelief. David is going to destroy his chances of becoming king for him.

“You and I will never be a secret,” David repeats, more forcefully.

“Then you’ll never be king,” Jack responds immediately.

David grows solemn and turns to Jack as if he’s squaring off.

“That’s your father talking. While I used to view his word as law, I have never believed his worldview to be absolute,” David says and Ezra nods slightly in agreement.

His father is definitely a hate-spitting tyrant, but Jack can’t shake the thought that on this subject, Silas is right. A kingdom’s citizens crave the comfort of a secure future and a legitimate heir; that comes from queens, not kings. How quickly would the people of Gilboa turn on David if they knew about Jack, if David insists on having an open and exclusive relationship with him?

Jack should have seen this coming. David has always been a naïve fool, so certain in the people’s love for him that he thinks he isn’t bound by the rules of monarchy. Kings have always married for money, politics and connections, but never for love.

David squints his eyes in thought, sensing the change in Jack’s demeanor.

“I need to speak with Ezra,” David says, trying to change the topic. “He is leading the mission to Gath, to help the refugees. You’re welcome to join us.”

“I promised Michelle I’d find her after talking to you.”

“Major Benjamin, good luck tomorrow,” Ezra says stiffening in attention and saluting.

“You too,” Jack salutes.

He shamelessly watches the way David’s ass moves under the fabric of his pants as he walks away with Ezra. It is firm and lovely, basically perfect. There might have been a time when Jack thought David was an annoying simpleton, but he’d always loved gazing at that ass. Not surprisingly, it feels even better than it looks.

He shakes his head, looking up into the cloudy night sky. He hopes that David is right, that Silas’ worldview is not absolute, because he’s tired of hiding his love in the shadows. He doesn’t want to be David’s secret.

* * *

Jack has been standing, frozen, in front of her door for five full minutes before he finally accumulates the courage to knock. It is almost nine o’clock. The Secretary’s plane lands in Bozrah in the morning to whisk them away to Shiloh. Jack can’t avoid this conversation indefinitely.

When she opens the door, she looks unkempt but beautiful, hair tied back with a few curls springing free and falling onto her cheeks.

“Jack? I saw you and David leave. I didn’t think we’d see you until tomorrow.”

That seemed to be the common assumption. Jack disregards the sharp reply on his tongue and instead asks, “Can I come in? Is Tamara…?”

Michelle opens the door. “She’s asleep in the next room. You didn’t disturb her.”

Jack paces the room a few times, picks up trinkets and books from the shelves before putting them back without even looking at them. Michelle simply watches. She must sense why Jack is here, but she refuses to start this conversation for him.

“When I arrived today,” Jack says looking at the rows of books rather than Michelle, “you greeted me with kindness. Why?”

“Because you’re my brother and I love you and it had been over a year. I missed you, Jack.”

The response is so genuine, not laced with acidic sarcasm like it would be from Jack’s tongue. Jack turns to her, finds her sitting rigidly on a chair beside the window with less ease than her tone belies. It gives Jack courage to see that hint of anger underneath. Anger is something he understands.

“I thought you and David had reconciled.”

“No,” she replies simply.

“That’s why I didn’t say anything when I arrived. Michelle, you have every right to hate me.”

“Hate you for what?”

“For stealing David,” Jack replies without hesitation.

“Is that what you did?”

Jack can’t take it anymore, he strides toward her, sitting in the chair adjacent to hers. “Please. I know you were kind when I arrived, but if you want to yell at me, now is your chance. I deserve it.”

“Would that make you feel better? Would that assuage your guilt?”

“No, I want you to do what you need for you to feel better.”

Michelle stares into her hands like they are the most interesting things on the planet, studies them for what seems like an eternity before replying, “I was mad, very mad. Did you listen to my voicemails before you canceled your phone?”

Jack shakes his head.

“Good. It didn’t take long for me to regret the things I said, so I’m glad you didn’t hear them.”

“Anything you said was justified,” Jack murmurs.

“How long are you going to wallow in guilt? I’m just asking so I can prepare myself, because you are depressing the hell out of me right now. Oddly, I think I like you better when you’re being an asshole.” She smiles.

“I’m just trying—“ Jack rubs his hand across his face and laughs. “This whole situation is so fucked up. I’m trying to make it better. I just want to repair the last remaining familial relationship I have.”

“Well, you haven’t lost me. I obviously don’t hate you. God knows what will happen to all of us tomorrow. We may not have time for depressing, angry conversations. So, what’s the point?”

“Why the fuck are you being so forgiving?” Jack asks, annoyed because he doesn’t deserve it. He knows how to fight, but he’s never known how to graciously accept forgiveness.

“After David told me, it didn’t take long before I started to wonder how it had happened. You and David,” Michelle says. “I wondered when he had first noticed you, so I asked him. Do you know what he said?”

It’s rhetorical, but Jack stupidly responds, “On that covert ops mission to Gath, the one that father forced me to take David on.”

Michelle’s lets out sharp breath. “That’s exactly what he said. It was so long ago. I never expected that answer and I got _really_ angry after that.”

Jack makes a face as if to say he’s sorry, because he is, and he doesn’t know what to say. It is all so incredibly inappropriate and odd, being in love with a twin sister and brother at the same time. Only someone like David could get away with it and still have both of them in his life.

“I didn’t talk to him for weeks,” she says. “Tamara and I temporarily moved out. But in the silence all of these other questions grew inside of me. I wondered how long you had loved him. Because I knew you loved him, Jack, despite that text message you sent. I knew that you ran off to Paris because you loved him. I thought a lot about those months back in Shiloh. Sometimes, you seemed to hate him so much and yet you didn’t. I thought about how you saved David from the firing squad. He wouldn’t even be here right now if you hadn’t saved his life then. I knew you loved him, but I couldn’t figure out when it had started. And then this entirely different question took over. It drove me crazy for a while.”

“What question was that?” Jack asks.

“’What if I was the one who stole David from you in the first place without even realizing it?’”

It’s a beautiful sentiment and Jack wishes it were true, wishes he had the moral high ground or some initial claim on David’s love.

“You didn’t,” Jack replies, his voice quiet with regret. “I had a boyfriend when David first came to Shiloh. I was with my boyfriend the night the lights went out. You don’t need to be understanding and forgiving, Michelle. You had a claim on him; you were there first. You have his child. I’ve behaved so badly.”

Michelle’s lips curve into a smile. There is a hint of happiness…or irony…to her expression. “Is that all it takes to ‘lay claim’ to another person’s soul, being there first?”

Jack simply stares, because Michelle has always been the most perceptive in their family. She’d simply sat back and watched while the rest of them yelled and manipulated and plotted. She’d learned to read all of them despite the constant lies. And because of that, she sees through Jack’s lies now – because he is lying. A part of him is sorry, but the other part?

The other part of him knows that he and David are bound together body and soul and that he’d do anything to preserve that bond. He’d destroy anything to keep David.

“No,” Jack finally replies. “You’re right. But David does love you and you love him.”

“I don’t love him like you do,” she says, without any hesitation. “I’ve always been less…theatrical than you, but even so, I can’t imagine running away to Paris because I couldn’t have him. You asked me why I’m okay with this. I wasn’t okay at first, but I’m getting there because I don’t need him like you do. And despite what you might think, I’ve never taken any joy in your misery, Jack. And this past year, you were miserable, weren’t you?”

“Michelle,” it comes out as a gasp, tears building in Jack’s eyes. He missed her, more than he ever realized. He feels like he hasn’t truly spoken to her in a decade.

Michelle squeezes his hand and smiles. She gets up and pulls out a bottle of wine and two glasses from the cabinet.

“Vintage, three hundred dollars,” she says. “No time like the present, especially for us. You want some?”

Jack has never said ‘no’ to a good bottle of alcohol. It is heavy with currant and tannins, perfectly-balanced. He sighs and takes another sip.

“Do you remember that trip we all took to Banff before Grandpa died?” Michelle asks.

“Of course,” Jack replies. He and Michelle were 13 years old and just starting to drift apart.

“I think about that trip a lot. That night we all stayed up playing poker and Mom and Dad actually laughed and seemed happy.”

Jack hasn’t thought of that night in years, but he can still remember that his mother won the game and she’d giggled like a schoolgirl after she’d beaten Silas, dragging all of the chips across the table toward her pile.

He smiles at the memory.

“What did you do the day after that poker night?” Michelle asks.

“I don’t remember.”

“I went on a hike with Grandpa,” Michelle says, looking into her wine glass with a melancholy smile. “He was still in good health. I remember I asked you and Mom and Dad to come, but you all had an excuse. Mom doesn’t hike, of course, because she’d have to take off her heels. And Dad was busy being king. You, I can’t remember why you didn’t go. Was there a boy?”

“No.” Jack can’t recall being attracted to any boys on that trip. “I probably just did something stupid by myself.”

Michelle nods, “You know how Grandpa hated the bodyguards, so we managed to ditch them and we went on a hike along this river. It was gorgeous, green glacial waters and these huge white peaks. I forgot my camera so I never had any pictures. Anyway, we came around this bend in the river and there was a mountain lion just standing there looking at us about 50 feet away.”

Jack has never heard this story and his eyes grow wide. Michelle finally looks up from the wineglass and sees the look of disbelief in his eyes.

“There was a pretty good breeze at our faces and the river was loud, so I don’t think he heard us or scented us. His whole body froze and he was staring us down. And he seemed massive, as big as a bear. I remember his tail was huge, which seems like a ridiculous thing to notice, but it was almost as long as the rest of his body.”

“What did you do?”

“Grandpa was obviously terrified and he pushed me behind him and told me not to run. I remember that comment seemed so strange, because I had no intention of running. I wasn’t scared at all. I’m not trying to say I was brave. I should have been scared, I just wasn’t.

“I stepped around Grandpa and the mountain lion looked at me for the first time and his entire body just relaxed and he yawned, like a housecat. Except his mouth was so big I think my entire head could have fit inside of it. And then he turned and disappeared into the trees.”

“Holy shit. You never told me about this, and neither did Grandpa.”

“We agreed not to. Mom and Dad were already upset enough that we’d skipped out on our bodyguards, they didn’t need to know.”

“Why are mentioning it now?” Jack asks.

“I don’t know. But I think about it sometimes, about how that mountain lion could have simply killed us. I still wonder why it didn’t. Was it not hungry? Was it because we startled it? Maybe. But I’ve always thought it was because it could tell that I wasn’t afraid of it. That it saw something kindred in me.”

“Is this supposed to be a metaphor, because if so, I’m not getting it?”

“No, maybe, I don’t know,” Michelle says with a laugh. “I just think about it sometimes when I know I need to be brave.”

“So, Father is the mountain lion?” Jack asks, still completely confused.

“It’s not a metaphor, Jack. It was just on my mind.” She seems slightly exasperated as she takes a sip of wine.

Jack pauses and ponders the story, because he thinks it is a metaphor even if Michelle doesn’t realize it, but then his mind wanders to Grandpa Kish, who he hasn’t thought about in months.

“Remember when Grandpa went through that woodworking phase?” Jack asks.

Michelle’s face lights up instantly. “The chair?”

Jack giggles. “Yeah, the chair. He worked on that thing for weeks. It was gorgeous. Pine, right?”

“Yeah, and he made that big show of giving it to Father for his birthday. And then Father sat down—“ Michelle loses the ability to speak from laughing.

“And the whole fucking thing collapsed underneath him,” Jack finishes her sentence through his own laughter.

Silas’ arms and legs had shot out in a perfect parody of falling, landing in a pile of broken wood while his entire family had fallen into fits of laughter. Silas had popped up, angry and yelling. Jack had clamped a hand over his mouth to stifle the chuckling. In the forced silence, their grandfather’s entire body had started to shake with laughter and everyone had descended into giggling again.

Slowly, amidst further ranting about what an uncaring family he had, a smile had crept onto Silas’ face.

“I always wondered if Grandpa did it on purpose,” Jack says.

“I’m sure he did. He built plenty of great furniture. That was the only piece that ever fell apart.”

“Like he was trying to teach Dad a lesson in humility.”

“Probably.” Michelle makes a stern face and wags a finger at Jack, mimicking their grandfather’s gravely voice, “’You may be a king but you are still my son, and I can knock you down a peg.’”

“Father was different after Grandpa died,” Jack says, the laughter draining away like water through a sieve.

“Yeah,” Michelle grows melancholy too. “More arrogant, more of an asshole.”

“I never realized it until now.”

“I did.”

Of course Michelle had noticed.

“I miss him,” Jack says, twirling his wineglass, “and I was never as close to him as you were.”

Michelle simply makes a pained expression and nods, taking a sip of wine. Silence envelops them, but it isn’t uncomfortable. It’s pensive and filled with nostalgia.

“If the story is a metaphor,” Michelle breaks the silence, “Then we are the mountain lion. We are the ones with the strength. We have the ability to hurt Dad more than he can hurt us.”

“But he thinks he’s the mountain lion?”

“Exactly,” Michelle says with a knowing smile. “That trip to Banff, before Grandpa died, before I got sick, before you went away to the academy, it was the last time I can remember all of us being together and genuinely happy.”

It’s sad but true, and Jack is certain it will forever be the last time his family was happy together. They’re irreparably fucked up now.

Jack pours both of them more wine and then leans back. “Remember that dog that Grandpa took in?”

Michelle starts chuckling again and nods, “The golden retriever? Oh God.”

She grabs her glass of wine and leans back, settling in for the story.

* * *

David is in bed, reading a book, when Jack enters his room an hour later. In the muted light of the lamp, he looks softer than usual, clean-shaven, the covers pulled up to his stomach leaving his hairless chest exposed. He smiles at Jack and the crinkles around his eyes become pronounced. Jack is immobilized momentarily by the sight of him, so normal and yet so divine.

David places his book on the end table and pulls the covers back, an invitation. Jack strips down to his boxers and slides into the bed, letting David roll him onto his right side so that Jack’s back is flush against David’s chest. He curls his left arm around Jack and pulls him back, lightly kissing Jack’s neck, sending tiny shivers down his spine.

Jack is never the little spoon when cuddling with men. In fact he rarely cuddles, but when he does he’s the big spoon. He’s slightly taller than David, so technically he should be the one with his body wrapped around David, but this feels right. He sighs and melts into the touch, turning his head to indulge in a few lazy kisses.

Jack could get lost in David’s lips, so full and delicious. He’s about to roll over and take this to the next level when David pulls away and simply nestles his face in the back of Jack’s neck, breathing him in.

They hold that way for minutes, happy and lazy. Jack tries to forget tomorrow.

“How old were you when you first kissed a boy?” Jack murmurs and feels David release a rush of breath behind him, not a chuckle but close.

“You want to talk about my ex-boyfriends?”

Jack runs his fingers along the blonde fuzz on David’s forearm. “So, he was your boyfriend?”

“I was sixteen.”

“Oh, scandalous underage kissing?”

“He was kind of a bad boy.” There is joy in David’s voice. It makes Jack chuckle.

“Really? Is that what you go for?”

“With boys, yeah,” David replies. “He used to skip class and smoke out in the parking lot. I was a good kid. I went to class, I never got drunk, but Kyle could make me do things I normally wouldn’t. It was the summer before my junior year and he had this bottle of Jagermeister he’d stolen from his older brother, so we drove out into the cornfields and got drunk.”

“On Jagermeister? Oh good lord.”

“Yeah, so our first kiss tasted like Jager, but I was too excited to care. He had a great mouth. It was nothing compared to yours, obviously. But he had nice lips. He’d make out with me when he was drunk, but he’d avoid me when he wasn’t.”

“Closet case,” Jack says, with a smile. “Trust me, I know.”

“At the end of the summer, he was arrested for stealing a car and taken away to juvey.”

Jack starts giggling uncontrollably. “Oh God, you really meant it with the bad boy thing, didn’t you?”

He can feel the smile on David’s face as he plants a few gentle kisses on the back of Jack’s neck and shoulders, “Well, I like what I like, Benjamin. Some things never change.”

Jack turns his body, so they’re facing each other and draws David down for a kiss, not a preamble to sex, just a kiss, slowly exploring David’s delicious mouth. When he pulls back, he feels warm and sated. He rolls onto his side again, so that David’s chest is aligned with his back and sighs.

“What about the second boy you kissed?”

“Well, that was in the military. I was twenty…”

Jack’s eyelids feel heavy and they slide closed as he listens to David’s stories, getting lost in his past. Wrapped in the warmth of David’s embrace, Jack forgets that tomorrow will ever come.


	16. The fight for you is all I've ever known

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from "Come Home" by OneRepublic and Sara Bareilles.

William Cross has 645 tallies scratched into his wall, but he missed the first few weeks. He didn’t keep track of the first few weeks, so he’ll never know exactly how many days he’s been in this prison. Is it 645 plus 21, plus 25? It drives him crazy that he’ll never know for sure.

Sometimes he hears voices through the walls, a man who calls himself Vesper Abaddon, the Bloody King of Carmel. It’s probably just a crazy old kook. King Silas killed Vesper decades ago when he conquered Carmel, didn’t he? What if it is Vesper? How many days has he been down here? Does he tally his days on the wall too or did he give up years ago?

The only glimmer of hope for William is the knowledge that his son, Andrew, is in the city, relatively free. Andrew isn’t allowed to leave the country and he is constantly under surveillance. Silas is right to be distrustful, but his meddling has impeded their plans for too long. It means Andrew can never visit, because he isn’t supposed to know that William is locked down here. Nobody is supposed to know. William Cross is just another Vesper Abaddon, another usurper king that Silas wants the world to forget.

The guard slides a tray of food through the slot in his door and he eats it like an animal, with his hands. They give him plastic utensils, but he realized months ago that it is easier to eat with his hands. Propriety and wealth have no meaning in solitary confinement.

His fingers brush against a folded piece of paper under the rice and his heart beats faster. It Andrew’s distinctive handwriting, angular and harsh.

**The exiles return. All of them. Our wait is over. Prepare.**

Shepherd and the Benjamin twins are retuning to Shiloh? It has been so long since William has felt joy that the sensation confuses him.

For too long the lamb has bounded and flourished outside of William’s reach. So he’d waited impatiently, hoping that the lamb would come back for the slaughter and now he has returned.

* * *

Rose, Silas and a dozen delegates are waiting at the Shiloh airport when they arrive. Silas’ face is schooled, but Rose looks agitated and overwhelmed.

The Austerian Secretary of State, Norma Taylor, departs the plane first with her entourage, then Jack, David and finally Michelle with Tamara in tow. The minute Rose’s eyes find Tamara her face crumples into joyous tears. Even Silas looks moved, like he can’t wait to meet his grandchild.

It was admittedly a good plan, letting them finally meet Tamara. It might lull the King into a blissful enough state that he can be reasoned with.

Everything else is forgotten as the scene collapses to only four people, crying in a huddle as the press cameras look on. Tamara looks afraid, but Michelle whispers to her reassuringly as she introduces her to grandma and grandpa.

The thought that a despot like Silas could ever be associated with that word seems absurd. But he looks so lost in delight, tears rolling down his cheeks as he takes in the sight of the toddler. Jack wonders if they were wrong to think he could ever hurt his own blood.

When Silas finally regains control of his emotions, he stands and addresses the Secretary. He still hasn’t acknowledged David or Jack.

“We should proceed with talks,” Silas says, his voice still warm with emotion.

He motions to a guard, who steps toward David and Jack with two sets of handcuffs.

“Your Majesty,” Secretary Taylor jumps in, “it was part of the agreement that these talks would include David Shepherd…and Jonathan Benjamin.”

Jack was not actually part of the deal, so he’s grateful that she includes him.

“Oh, they’ll be joining us, Madam Secretary, but you understand that they are criminals. The last time Shepherd willingly handed himself over to me, his men attacked the convoy to free him. This is merely for my protection.”

David willingly extends his hands in front of him to be cuffed. Jack shakes his head and follows suit. His mother and father still haven’t looked him in the eyes. He still isn’t their son.

Rose slips her arm around Michelle and leads her and Tamara away while Silas directs everyone else toward a line of state vehicles, in the opposite direction.

Michelle glances over her shoulder, just once, catching Jack’s eyes and widening hers in alarm. He returns the expression. Silas’ plan is obvious, divide and conquer, but at least Michelle and Tamara are safe. Rose will protect them.

Jack and David are on their own.

* * *

They drive through the streets, lined with a pulsing mass of citizens trying to see through the tinted windows of the state vehicles, trying to see the future king. A cheer resounds through the crowd when David steps out of the vehicle and Jack can see Silas tense even though he tries to hide it. His control is slipping. David Shepherd is already poised to take the throne and everyone knows it.

Jack walks beside David into the Great Hall, lined with a sea of familiar faces that Jack never thought he’d see again. His gaze alights on the angular nose and chin of his cousin, Andrew Cross. He looks the same, sour expression and floppy hair, except for a pronounced scar on his left cheek. It is pink and angry, the flesh slightly depressed underneath. It is an old scar. It takes Jack a second to realize that he gave Andrew that scar the night he beat him up and escaped the palace.

“Looking good, Andrew,” Jack smirks as they pass him. “I hear women love scars.”

Andrew feigns nonchalance, “Then I should thank you, cousin, for the scar.”

Andrew’s eyes turn to David and they grow so hateful, Jack loses the rhythm of his footsteps and almost throws himself at Andrew to wipe that look off his face. It promises pain and it is completely directed at David, a man who has never wronged Andrew. In fact, Jack can’t remember if David and Andrew ever even met.

David bumps Jack’s shoulder, distracting him from Andrew, and gives him a faint smile.

Jack hasn’t been in the royal conference room in over two years, since the day he returned after the coup and asked his father to kill him. The memories flood back, where he was standing when Silas called him a faggot, when Jack ordered a soldier to shoot a man, when Michelle stood up against him.

He remembers knowing that the crown would never sit on his head even as it hovered over him. He recalls his complete lack of surprise looking out of the windows, seeing the tanks rolling down the street. He remembers how David’s betrayal hurt almost as much as the loss of the crown.

Now David is sitting rigidly beside him, hands cuffed, with Secretary Taylor on his other side.

“Secretary,” King Silas says after sitting at the table’s center, “Gath has long been our enemy and Austeria has done nothing but support them. Your country gave them weapons and tanks during our war with them. Your country is culpable in the deaths of hundreds of Gilboans. And now you come to plead for alliance?”

“Austeria pleads for nothing,” Secretary Taylor responds. “We come to offer our support to Gilboa, if she’ll fight against a common threat.”

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend?” Silas asks sarcastically.

Secretary Taylor chuckles, “The enemy of my enemy is my _ally,_ King Silas. Gath is a friend to Austeria. Gilboa is not. But I hope she will be an ally.”

Silas takes a deep breath and rises from his chair, takes a moment to gaze out on his city before turning back to his audience.

“Gilboa has been at war for so many years. Generations lost and you ask me to send my nation’s children into battle again after less than two years of peace? This is not a request I take lightly, Madam Secretary.”

“King Silas,” David speaks for the first time, his voice confident but respectful, “you know how much I detest war, the lengths I would go to prevent it—”

“War is not for you to encourage or prevent,” Silas says darkly, “for you are not king.”

Jack has to stifle a chuckle. Silas is so threatened by David Shepherd, it is almost laughable.

Secretary Taylor places a hand on David’s arm, silencing him, and says, “War is coming for all of us. Our nations have never been friends, but Austeria has the strongest military in this region, apart from Ekron. And Gilboa is currently the best tactical location from which to launch a full-scale attack against Ekron. From Gilboa, we can liberate Gath and push the Philistine forces north. Austeria is prepared to go to war no matter what, but the battle will be more effective if our offensive is launched from Gilboa, if our nations can put the past behind us and become allies.”

Silence envelops the small delegation as Silas ponders the offer.

“I am not unreasonable, despite what some might think. I welcome talks with Austeria,” he says. “Come, Secretary, we’ll speak in private.”

Secretary Taylor stands as David speaks up, “The refugees.”

Ezra Mason and the other soldiers have already slipped into Gath and are actively seeking out David’s family in an attempt to save them, but they can’t save 30,000 people without Silas’ help.

Silas regards him with disdain, eyebrows raised. “What was that, Shepherd?”

“The refugees in Corinth, the people from the disputed territory. Gilboa must give them safe passage across the Prosperity River or they’ll be slaughtered.”

“They could go to Ammon,” King Silas replies.

“That is 500 miles away. They’d never make it,” David replies, slightly frantic. “Your border is 20 miles. Three years ago those refugees were Gilboan, many of them fought and died for you, and all you’ve ever done to repay them is turn your back on them. They are Gilboan. They are your people. Please, Your Majesty.”

“Moving,” Silas says with a smirk that indicates he isn’t moved at all. “Words of national identity and duty, but your family is in Corinth, aren’t they?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Selfishness does not become a king, Shepherd.”

“Neither does spite,” Jack cuts in, aware that all eyes are turning to him but only caring about his father’s dark glare. They are the first words Jack has spoken to Silas.

“The prodigal returns…” Silas murmurs.

“But the prodigal what? I’m no longer your son or the prince. So, just say what you’re thinking, ‘The prodigal _faggot_ returns.’”

Silas turns to Jack completely, as if there is no one else in this room.

“Does it make you feel better, _Father,_ to think that I betrayed you and aligned myself with Shepherd because I’m a faggot and not because David would make an infinitely better king than you?”

“You will not speak that way without consequence,” Silas’ anger instantly burns red hot. Jack hadn’t noticed before, but David and Michelle are correct. Jack can rip away the king’s façade away with just a few words, and expose the cruel man underneath.

The king does love him.

“You know that Gilboa must help those refugees,” Jack continues, full of confidence and purpose, because he finally sees that he is the fissure in his father’s strength. “They are families, women and children, Gilboan by birth and then handed over to Gath because it suited you at the time. Don’t let your hatred of me and David stop you from doing what is right. There are no video cameras here. This meeting is confidential. Nobody needs to know what was said or by whom. The credit of the rescue will go to you. That is what David is giving you today, along with your grandchild and your daughter. He’s letting you be the hero. So just take his gift and say ‘thank you,’ rather than being a spiteful asshole.”

He can tell by the expression on David’s face that he thinks Jack has possibly blown the entire thing. But Jack simply leans back into his chair, smirking and raising his eyebrow at his father.

Silas fights it, genuinely fights the look of begrudging respect that is creeping onto his face. “The refugees will be allowed to enter our borders. I’ll contact the military base outside Gilgal and mobilize a rescue.”

David bows his head and sighs in gratitude, but Jack can feel the blade that is raised over their necks. There will be a catch. With Silas Benjamin, there’s always a catch.

* * *

After the Secretary and her staff are excused, Thomasina slips through the side door and approaches Jack and David. Her face is expressionless, hollow eyes under half-closed lids. Jack has always wondered if there is something wrong with her eyelids, like the muscles don’t work properly and that’s why she’s incapable of opening them fully. Or is she simply that unimpressed with the world around her?

“Take them to the east wing,” Silas says to her, before following the Secretary out of the room.

Thomasina pulls a small handgun from inside her jacket, motioning Jack and David toward the side door.

“My love, you won’t need that?” Jack replies with a smile. She, of course, responds with dead-eyed silence. Jack didn’t miss this fucking city or these fucking assholes in the slightest.

She leads them through the hallways to the room where Jack was imprisoned with Lucinda. It looks the same and Jack grows rigid with fear, remembering too many days spent bored and slowly going crazy. The guards secure David to a chair next to the bed, hands cuffed behind his back.

Jack tries to regain his composure and winks at Thomasina as they secure him to the another chair on the opposite wall. “I never knew you were this kinky, Thomasina. Chains, handcuffs. Tell me, are you a dom or a sub?”

She stares, eyes lidded, and says nothing.

“I bet you’re a sub. I bet you love being told what to do,” he smirks, “God knows you certainly do anything my father asks, don’t you?”

“The king approaches,” she replies coldly, stepping out of the door after Silas enters, closing it behind her, leaving Jack, David and Silas alone.

“Back in your luxury prison, Jack. Is it bringing back pleasant memories?”

“A few, like beating up my cousin and escaping your tyranny. That was good memory.”

Silas smiles, he often enjoys Jack’s snarkiness in private. It’s only in public that it rubs him the wrong way. He turns to David.

“So, tell me, Shepherd, now that you’ve tasted both of my children, which one is sweeter?”

Before David can reply, Jack laughs darkly, “It’s amazing how you do that. Say ‘both of my children’ as if you only have two.”

Silas’ eyes widen in surprise.

“Oh wait,” Jack’s tone is sing-song and sarcastic, “do you only have two children now? Did your little bastard son finally succumb to his illness?”

“I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that you told him, Shepherd, since you’ve grown so close.”

“You should have been the one to tell him about Helen and Seth,” David replies. “And our love is pure no matter how you try to sully it with your words.”

“How sweet,” Silas says, cocking his head and smiling.

“Shame comes from within,” David replies. “It doesn’t matter what you say to us. I know the purity of our hearts. You’re words can’t touch us, so you’re wasting your breath.”

“Well, look at that,” Silas says, sitting in the third chair in between David and Jack, “he’s actually in love with you, Jack. I’ll admit this has me a bit confounded. I assumed it was unrequited.”

“Wasting your breath,” David replies, but Silas is staring at Jack. His words are for Jack.

“What did you plan to do, _son_? Since you can’t be king, you’ll sleep with the king and wield power that way?”

“It’s certainly worked for Mother,” Jack replies, “but the fatal flaw in that plan is that I’m Helen in this situation, not Mother. I’m the shameful thing that must be hidden.”

“Jack, you’re not a shameful thing,” David says quickly, but Silas and Jack are so focused on this dance, they hardly notice him.

“Ah, but you can still whisper in his ear as you lie in bed together, ‘my king, you should invade that country’ and he’ll listen. Is that why you set your sights on him? Has your ambition become so little? I always thought you wanted more from your life than to be the king’s whore?”

“They’re just words, Jack,” David says as Jack sucks in a breath, the slur wounding him even as he tries to act like it doesn’t.

“Were you always this way?” Jack asks, voice strained with pain.

“What way is that?” Silas responds.

“That you only see relationships in terms of power. Or is that just how see me?” Jack asks, suddenly realizing that his father’s taunts are always about him, not Rose or Michelle. “You think I’m not capable of love, that I build relationships around who I can manipulate? Is that what you think? I’m too selfish and fucked up to ever love these men?”

“I think you love yourself above all things,” Silas replies.

“No, that’s you,” Jack says. “Regardless of everything you’ve said, I’m the only legitimate son of the king. I could still make a viable play for your crown, but I won’t. The crown belongs to David and I would place it on his head myself. But you, you won’t even do what’s right for Gilboa unless people see and applaud you for it.”

“You will not sit in judgment of me,” Silas’ tone turns clipped and annoyed as he rises and approaches Jack like an angry bear. “You think you know so much, that you understand the world. Being king is nothing but sorrow and sacrifice. You’re back where you belong, son, and this time you’ll do as I say.”

“I’m not your son, as you’ve said yourself.”

“I am king. I can just as easily restore your titles as I can strip them.”

“I don’t want your titles,” Jack hisses, tilting his head down and glaring at Silas. “Son, prince, faggot, whore. You can keep your fucking titles!”

Silas shakes his head, clearly disappointed. “You could have had everything, Jack. You could have had the crown, but you chose to throw it all away for David Shepherd. Was he really worth it?”

“Nobody has ever wanted me to have the crown, including you.”

“That’s not true. I did everything I could to secure your future rule, Jack. I told you _exactly_ what you had to do to become king and you failed to do it.”

“Oh my God.” Jack looks up at the ceiling and laughs incredulously. He gazes at David who is watching stone-faced, knowing that this is Jack’s fight and trying to stay out of it. “You think you were doing me a favor telling me that I couldn’t be who I was?”

Silas doesn’t reply and Jack’s frustration morphs into fire.

“Fuck you!” he yells.

“Jack, please—“ David says.

“Don’t, David,” Jack replies in frustration.

“I’ve never minced my words.” Silas’ voice is calm, completely in control. “Every king must sacrifice. Your men, that was your sacrifice to make and you weren’t strong enough.”

Jack feels like he’s standing on the palace steps again, his father growling in his ear that he knows about the boys, telling Jack to numb his desires until they’re frozen and necrotic. A tear slides down his cheek and he hates his father even more for the fact that his hands are tied behind his back, because he can’t wipe away his obvious weakness with the swipe of a hand.

“Jack.” He can hear David calling to him through the ringing in his ears, but he doesn’t care.

Silas drags his chair in front of Jack and sits, filling his field of view. It’s like he is a child again and Silas is the entire world.

“Your mother gave you life after you betrayed me in court,” Silas says. “She also gave you life after your attempted coup.”

“What a loving mother,” Jack says through clenched teeth. “I’m so lucky for the wonderful family I have.”

“I say this only so that you’ll know that I am the one giving you life now, not your mother.”

Jack takes a deep breath, tries to hold his anger inside of himself. Despite his pain and hatred, he wonders what his father wants from him, why he is choosing to spare his life now.

“You and Shepherd are going to repair all of the damage you’ve caused,” Silas says, leaning closer. Jack turns away and looks down. “The Philistines are at our gates. War is about to erupt and I am going to save our nation from destruction again. I am the king and the hero that this nation will need, not Shepherd. Do you understand, Jack?”

Jack purses his lips and doesn’t reply.

“You are going to toe the line completely. Nothing out of place, no comments that I don’t approve, no rebellious actions or thoughts. Nothing.”

“And why am I going to do that?” Jack mutters.

“Because Shepherd’s life depends on it and you love him.” His tone is so sarcastic on the word _love_ it makes Jack ill. As if their love has no value, apart from being a weakness to be exploited.

“He’s the light of your life, the soul of your soul, right?” Silas asks.

“I’ll be okay, Jack,” David says, his voice calm but firm. “Just do what you have to do. Everything will be fine.”

Jack disregards him. His entire world is still Silas. No matter how much distance and hatred he tries to put between them, his father can still hollow him out with a few simple words. He hates himself for his own weakness.

“You think you’ve won?” Jack asks, his voice cracking slightly.

“No. But I will win. I have everyone I need now. My daughter, my granddaughter. My son.”

“Stop calling me that.”

Silas studies Jack, tilting his head and smiling, looking for the chink in the armor. He rises and bangs on the door. Thomasina enters.

“You can take Shepherd away now.”

“No,” Jack says as one guard unlocks David while the other keeps his weapon trained on him. They push him toward the door, but he never looks away from Jack. His eyes are pleading and Jack knows exactly what he’s trying to say, _You’re strong. You can do this. Everything will be okay. I trust you._

“David,” Jack murmurs and David smiles, strained and defiant.

“I love you,” David says as they push him out the door.

“David!” Jack yells, hanging his head when he hears no reply. He’ll find him. He’ll save him. This isn’t goodbye. He calms his breathing, pushes away the tears and looks up into his father’s eyes.

“You’re back where you belong with your family, not lying in bed with that traitor,” Silas says. “And eventually you’ll realize that I’m right, that you don’t need him.”

With his father, it always comes back to the fact that Jack prefers men to women. It’s the only thing Silas sees when he looks at him, and that hurts more than Silas’ hatred of it, because Jack is more than gay. He’s also a brother, an uncle, a soldier, a leader, a friend, but all that his father ever sees is the faggot son who needs to be molded into something less shameful.

“I will never toe your line.” Jack lifts his eyes, staring his father down. “You’ll have to kill me first.”

“I don’t have to hurt you, Jack, because I have Shepherd now.” He leans back in his chair. “I’ll lock him away somewhere that you’ll never find him, and you’ll do exactly as I say or he won’t eat for a week. Step way out of line, and I’ll have him flogged and send the video straight to you.”

“You can’t do that,” Jack whispers, desperate and grasping. “The people love David too much. They’ll turn on you in a heartbeat if you hurt him. Some of them already have. You heard how they cheered for him today.”

“We’ll be at war. The people will have bigger things to worry about than what happened to David Shepherd. There will come a time when they won’t even remember his name. And I’ll be the king who allied our nation with Austeria. I’ll be the king who fought back the Philistines and saved Gilboa. You play your cards right, and you can be by my side for those victories.”

Jack closes his eyes and breathes in and out, trying to remain calm. His father thinks he’s weak and pliable like clay. That is why he is choosing him over David now, not for love, but because he thinks David is strong and Jack is weak. He thinks he can break Jack.

Jack takes a deep breath and all of the turmoil, the tears, and the self-doubt slip away.

He isn’t that same man who stood on the steps of the palace and cried as his father stripped away his façade and gutted him with the truth. Jack isn’t ashamed of the truth anymore. He isn’t ashamed that God doesn’t want him to be king. He no longer desires the crown, but someone like Silas Benjamin can never understand that Jack genuinely wants someone else to be king.

“You have a tiger by the tail and you’ll never be able to control it.” Jack’s voice is hard and cold and for a second Silas looks at him with something akin to respect.

“Shepherd, the little lamb, is a tiger now?”

“Yes, and me, and Michelle, and every citizen of Gilboa whose heart has already turned away from you. Your control is slipping. You’ll never get it back this way.”

“I’ve defeated worse than Shepherd and a little rebellion.”

Silas rises, drags the chair back to the wall and stands next to the door, saying, “This is your last chance, son. Don’t throw away your birthright for a roll in the hay. Trust me, nobody is worth that.”

“You have no idea who I really am, do you?” Jack asks, his voice quiet with emotion. He’s never realized this fact until now, too busy trying to fit into Silas’ mold to ever realize that Silas had no idea of Jack’s true nature.

Silas frowns, clearly disappointed in his son. “I know you. You want to be king, not the man who warms the king’s bed at night.”

Silas doesn’t know him at all, and that sentence proves it.

“You think I’m a gullible idiot with no conviction,” Jack says, and for the first time he feels sorry for Silas, that he is so narrow-minded and power-hungry that he can’t understand true sacrifice or true love. “You think that you can give me a pat on the head and wave the crown in my face and I’ll turn on everything I believe in.”

Silas purses his lips and raises an eyebrow. “You will. I realize that you think yourself in love right now and that’s blinding you. But despite all of your other failings, Jack, you’ve always had ambition, and that will win out, eventually. And when that day comes you can plead for my forgiveness and maybe I’ll grant it. Maybe.”

Jack rolls his eyes. It is such bullshit. He can’t believe that he struggled to win this man’s acceptance for years. He can’t believe that he ever cared what this man thought of him. He is all manipulation and lies. Jack knows that he will never be king, because David Shepherd belongs on the throne, whether Jack is by his side or not.

That is what Silas will never understand about his son. This isn’t about Jack. This is about David and his destiny. It has always been about David.

“I must go north and help my soldiers save 30,000 refugees from the blades of the Philistines. I fully planned to let them cross the river before you arrived. I’m not so cruel as you think. Now, I can save my people and have my family by my side, all while David Shepherd rots in prison waiting for the world to forget him.”

Silas walks to the door and raps on it twice.

“I think we’ll keep you here for now, Jack. I’ll give you some time to contemplate your past mistakes.”

“The only mistake I made was wasting years trying to make you happy,” Jack says and he feels free, like the weight has lifted.

Silas’ mouth tilts up in an expression that Jack can’t interpret, “History is written by the victors and the favor of the masses can shift faster than the wind. This is your last chance to pick the winning side, Jack, and to write your own history someday.”

It is the only true statement Silas has made, the only piece of advice Jack will take to heart. The winning side is David, Jack will make sure of that.

Silas steps out of the door and Jack can hear the clicking of his heels on the wooden floor as he walks away.

Two guards enter and approach Jack with the keys to his cuffs. His body stills and he waits, measuring their movements. One points a handgun at Jack’s head while the other unlocks the cuffs.

He rubs his wrists and looks up at the armed guard through his lashes. He should acquiesce, David’s life and the lives of countless others hang in the balance, but the memory of his months in this prison take hold. Too many nights trying to avoid impregnating Lucinda, too many days feeling crazy as he talked to himself.

He should go down without a fight, but that’s never been his nature.

“You aren’t cleared to shoot me,” Jack says to the armed guard and kicks his heel into the other guard’s knee as hard as he can. It crunches sickeningly as it bends in the wrong direction. The guard cries out, falling to the ground.

Jack twists his body, sweeping his right leg into the armed guard, making him topple backward. Jack follows his body as it falls, lunging for the gun still gripped in his right hand.

His fingers are only a few inches from the weapon when every cell in his body lights up and tenses. He rolls off the guard onto the ground, twitching and only vaguely aware that they’ve tasered him.

The electric current switches off and Jack can breathe again, but he has no time to let his body recover. He pushes himself onto his hands and knees and starts to rise when a guard strikes the back of his thigh with a baton.

He goes down with a cry.

They drag the sobbing guard out of the room as Jack holds his injured leg. They don’t say anything, no quips about being a traitor or a faggot. They simply shake their heads and close the door, leaving Jack to his prison.

* * *

When they bring him dinner, they enter with a taser trained on him rather than a gun. They learn quickly.

He throws the food tray at them, managing to knock one of them in the side of the head.

* * *

Thomasina comes with food the following morning, along with two guards, all equipped with batons and tasers. No guns except for the one strapped to Thomasina’s thigh. Jack eyes it openly as she places the food on the table.

Jack approaches like a cat stalking prey, head down, eyes narrowed. He looks at the tray, all of the utensils are plastic. Scrambled eggs, oatmeal and fresh fruit. He grabs a handful of eggs and looks up at Thomasina who shakes her head slowly.

He smirks and lobs the eggs at her, enjoying the greasy stains they leave on her crisp pantsuit.

She takes a deep breath. “You need to eat, Jack.”

“Or what? Father will strip me of my titles? Imprison the man I love? Try to manipulate me into being his puppet?”

“You know what he’ll do if you don’t cooperate,” she replies. “You know who he will hurt.”

“The future king of Gilboa,” Jack refuses to call David something as trivial as his name. Thomasina must be made to realize that she is a traitor to the future sovereign.

“King Silas has given you a three-day pass to get this out of your system while he is in the north assisting in the efforts to save the refugees. But when he returns, Jack, Shepherd will pay for any of your continued rebellion.”

“Then I guess I can keep throwing food at you for the next three days,” Jack says, picking up the bowl of oatmeal and flinging it at Thomasina. It’s childish, but it’s the only joy he has, watching it stick to her blouse like modern art.

Thomasina leaves without any reaction. The woman is as cold as ice.

She doesn’t return with lunch or dinner, but they end up splattered on the walls and the guards too. Jack’s stomach is burning with hunger, but he won’t give them the satisfaction of eating what they give him. He’ll do this until he faints from malnutrition.

He falls into bed that night, his second night, weak and in pain, the stink of old food growing appetizing to his famished body. Sleep comes fitfully.

He awakens filled with depression and doesn’t even get up to look at breakfast or lunch as they are brought in. He lays on the bed and stares daggers at the guards, who still keep two tasers aimed at him as if he is a mountain lion lying in wait to pounce rather than a man who is starving and lost.

* * *

Dinner has been sitting on the table getting cold for half an hour when Jack shuffles over to it. He’s had some water, but he is presently on 48 hours without food. His head is pounding and his muscles are slow and aching.

He’s about to pick up the tray and hurl it at the wall when he sees a folded piece of paper tucked under the rice, the corner of it barely sticking out.

Maybe it’s a message from David or Michelle. Excitement tingling through his fingers, Jack pulls the piece of paper from under the rice and unfolds it. The writing is angular and severe.

**Cousin, I hope you had a chance to say ‘goodbye’ to your boyfriend. I’m sorry for your loss.**

Andrew’s words sink in slowly like water into fabric. They are almost too vague to be understood, purposefully vague. Except the last sentence is something people only say after a loved one dies.

David can’t be dead. God wouldn’t let that happen. Silas wouldn’t let that happen. He needs David alive so he can use him to control Jack. Plus, his citizens would turn on him immediately if David died under his custody.

Of course, that’s why Andrew wants David dead, to take out two kings with one blow. Andrew plans to kill David himself…or he already has.

Why the fuck does his entire family have to be populated by backstabbing, power-hungry assholes? Except Michelle, of course. Thank God for Michelle.

Jack had been so focused on Silas, he’d forgotten about Andrew…and William. Where the fuck is William? He realizes that he hasn’t heard anything about him in almost two years, too wrapped up in David and his own problems to give William and Andrew more than a passing thought. Truthfully, he’d been happy to be rid of them. He’d let himself forget them, like a man wandering through a pit of vipers who thinks that if he simply ignores the snakes, he won’t get bitten.

Jack looks around the room, assessing the potential in every object as he picks up the bread from the tray and crams it into his mouth. This is not the time to hunger strike. He’s finished destroying himself.

He isn’t anyone’s puppet or whipping boy.

He’s going to get out of this prison and find David. If he’s too late, if David is already dead, Silas, Andrew, William, he’ll burn every last one of them to the ground.

And if Jack isn’t too late, he’ll save David’s life first and then burn them to the ground.


	17. When I turn jet black

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> marlowe-tops did a fabulous beta read and made this chappie way better.
> 
> Chapter title from "Boats & Birds" by Gregory and the Hawk
> 
> Trigger warnings: death, violence, blood, suicide. It's not as bad as it sounds, but I always include trigger warnings.

Jack considers displaying Andrew’s note for the camera mounted above the door, but quickly rejects the idea. If he tells the guards there is a plot against David, they’ll simply investigate and he’ll still be locked in prison.

He has to get out and the only way to do that is to inspire Thomasina and her gun to come back.

There are two surveillance cameras on either side of the main room and one in the bathroom. The only place he isn’t monitored is in the shower.

He goes through all of the dresser drawers and closets and finds nothing. The guards removed all of the metal, the glassware and every mirror after he attacked them, rightfully afraid that he would make a weapon. He needs something sharp, which leaves only two options: pull off a splinter of wood from the dresser or somehow break the window that overlooks the courtyard. The second option is better but riskier.

He sinks his teeth into an apple and walks to the window while peering at the cameras and calculating angles. He is only visible to one of the cameras and his body could provide visual cover while he breaks the window. Thankfully the glass is paned. If he manages to break it, the whole thing won’t shatter, just a small section.

But there will be a sound.

He starts the shower in the bathroom. It isn’t much background noise, but it’s the best he can do. Stripping off his shirt, he makes it look like he is planning to take a shower and wanders over to the window, turning his back to the camera, contemplating the fading light of the evening.

Rubbing the two rings on his right hand, he prays that the metal can break the glass. One ring is platinum, but the other is steel. He punches the window, pain radiating up his forearm. Nothing. He tries again, nothing. Again. Again.

The punches are short, intense bursts as he tries to hide his movements from the camera. It isn’t enough. He has to punch as hard as he can and if the guards see and burst in, he will simply have to use the glass fragments as a weapon and hope for the best.

He makes a show of it, punching the wall and the metal bars, making it look like he is angry and desperate, indiscriminately taking out his frustration. He lands the fifth blow on weak corner of the lower right pane. It fractures like a spider web outward from the steel ring, but doesn’t shatter. Jack taps it lightly and a couple glass fragments fall away. He tries not to giggle as he pulls a jagged three-inch shard from the window.

It’s now or never.

He turns back to the camera, pulling the shard down his left wrist and forearm. The pain is hot and intense. He cuts a second line immediately, before he can second-guess his decision. Heat crawls up his arm and into his chest. He can feel the blood pumping through his body, a deep excruciating _thump thump…thump thump._

He has no intention of killing himself so the cuts are shallow. He merely needs Thomasina and the guards to think he is suicidal, but there is so much blood flowing from his arm, he momentarily panics. What if he does bleed to death? What if he’s wrong and the artery is not as deep as he thinks?

If that is the case, time is of the essence.

He drops to his knees and falls onto his left side, throwing his bleeding left arm above his head so that both cameras can see it.

He waits, counting the seconds. _One, two, three._

Blood seeps out of the cuts but already the flow is slowing and from experience he knows how much blood a man can lose before he dies. He remembers pushing his hands into the wound in Private Reynolds’ stomach the night he was captured by Gath. The blood had just kept oozing through his fingers, painting the world vermillion.

_Eighteen, nineteen, twenty._

Blood spreads outward, claiming everything in its path, as the pain finally becomes bearable.

_Thirty-two, thirty-three._

He hears the metallic squeak of the lock turning and then the door opening. Two guards enter, one with a medical kit, the other with a taser.

“Prince Jack?” one of them asks. It’s the first time he’s been called _prince_ in over a year. They are concerned and trying to play to his vanity.

He tilts his head and looks at them with lidded eyes. The glass shard is still clasped in his right hand, so he rests it on the soft skin of his neck. The guards freeze.

“Please, don’t force me to plunge this into my carotid,” Jack murmurs, keeping his voice weak. “Just let me bleed out, please.”

“Prince Jack,” the guard says while the other one angles the taser toward the ground, “there is no need to do that. Please don’t hurt yourself anymore. We just want to help you.”

The blood flow from his arm is starting to ebb. He rolls over and pulls his left arm under him, feeling light-headed. He just has to kill time until someone important arrives. So, he keeps talking, keeps them in a state of careful concern.

Almost a minute has passed when Thomasina appears in the doorway, eyes wide and panting as if she’s been running. Her gun is still strapped to her hip, in her haste she seems to have forgotten its presence. Jack suppresses the look of triumph that wants to creep onto his face.

“Jack.” She pushes past the guards and then the queen appears behind her, shaking and breathing hard. Jack’s stomach lurches and all of his smug giddiness dissipates. Her face is lined with worry and her movements are frantic. There is nothing of her normal measured grace or the cold indifference that she showed him at the airport. In this moment, she is not the queen; she is just his mother.

His left arm is throbbing and he is weak from the hunger strike and the blood loss. He longs to reach for her like when he was a child, before an earthquake of lies sliced a fissure through their relationship.

He wishes that he could simply tell her his woes now and trust that she would fix them like she used to, but he can’t. He doesn’t know her anymore, and maybe he never did.

He glares into her eyes and pushes the glass shard into his neck, hard enough for a tiny bead of blood to well up, and whispers, “Stop.”

Thomasina and Rose halt, only a couple of feet from him.

“I won’t live like this, Mother,” Jack says. “I won’t be Father’s puppet. He can’t use me if I’m dead.”

Rose reaches for Jack and pleads, “Jack, honey, you won’t have to live like that, I promise. Please, don’t do this.”

Her concern is so genuine, it shatters Jack’s cold and calculated exterior. A tiny bud of hope blooms inside of him, hope that his mother still loves him.

Dr. Baker, the family physician flies into the room, a small bag of medical supplies tucked under his right arm. The queen stops him with a raised hand and looks back at Jack, her eyes pleading and her expression broken.

“Please,” she gasps.

Jack lets the glass shard slip out of his fingers and clatter onto the floor. Thomasina instantly kicks it out of his reach as Rose falls to her knees beside him, running her hand gently across Jack’s forehead. He leans into her touch as Dr. Baker pulls cloths and bottles from his bag.

“Thomasina,” Dr. Baker says as he wets a cloth, “I need your help. Dab away the blood around the wounds very carefully with this. I need to put coagulates on it and bandage it and then we can move him for further treatment.”

Thomasina kneels beside Jack. Her gun is buttoned into its holster so Jack can’t simply pull it free. She starts to gently clean the blood from his forearm. His mother is still kneeling beside him, her hand clasped in his. Her presence is so comforting, Jack has to force himself to ignore her. He has to remain emotionally detached.

Dr. Baker inspects the wound as Thomasina cleans it. “You’re lucky, Jack, you didn’t hit the artery or any major vessels. You shouldn’t need surgery.”

Jack suppresses the smirk. Any piece of luck he’s ever had in his life, he fabricated himself, just like now.

“I’m sorry, Thomasina,” Jack whispers, pulling his hand from his mother and punching Thomasina in the gut. He keeps the punch soft because he’s never hit a woman before and it seems wrong even if he does detest Thomasina sometimes. She lets out an _oomph_ and falls backward.

In one fluid motion, Jack unclips the holster at Thomasina’s hip and pulls the gun free, clicking off the safety and pointing it at his mother’s head.

Rose’s eyes widen and her concern dissolves into anger.

“What are you doing, Jack?” Her voice is cold steel.

“Everyone in this room needs to stop moving right now,” Jack says, his voice rising with the promise of violence. Everyone grows still. “Mother, I didn’t want to do this, but you and Father left me no choice. I’m not some rebellious dog who needs to be caged and beaten until he complies. I’m your son.”

“I can offer you no sympathy when you have a gun pointed at me,” Rose replies, unafraid.

“Where is David?” Jack asks.

“I have no idea.”

“I don’t believe you,” Jack says, slowly pushing himself onto his knees and angling his body so he has a better view of everyone in the room, Rose, Thomasina, the doctor and two guards. He is woefully outnumbered.

“What is this about?” Rose asks.

Jack studies his mother’s cool countenance, but he remembers the way she cried when she met Tamara. She doesn’t have to be his enemy. His life was always better when they were allies. He decides to trust her one more time.

“Andrew is planning to kill David and blame it on Father so that the citizens turn on him.”

Rose jerks backward at this news and exchanges a quick glance with Thomasina.

“Why do you think this?”

“That note from Andrew on the table by my food.” He gestures with the gun. “Thomasina, will you please grab it for my mother?”

Rose studies the note, while Dr. Baker continues treating Jack’s wounds, despite the gun and the tension. He had been an army doctor before taking this position, so he isn’t easily fazed.

“Your father is not an idiot,” Rose says. “Andrew isn’t allowed to leave the country or go anywhere alone. Two guards constantly tail him. They haven’t reported anything out of the ordinary.”

“Will you please check again?”

“Only if you stop pointing a gun at me,” Rose replies.

Jack lets the barrel of the gun drop to the floor, not because she asked him to, but because it felt wrong pointing a weapon at someone he used to love more than anything.

Thomasina dials a number into her phone and waits, shaking her head. She tries another number. Nothing.

“His guards aren’t answering their phones,” Thomasina says.

“Because they’re already dead,” Jack states. “Mother, please you have to trust me. If Andrew succeeds, the monarchy that you spent years building will crumble.”

“It already has,” Rose replies. “It crumbled the moment David Shepherd arrived.”

Jack tries a different tactic. “David is the father of your grandchild. You can’t let him die. He’s your family now, whether you like it or not.”

“You’re asking me to help him for Tamara?” Rose asks, her voice laced with sarcasm as she stands up. The situation is slipping out of Jack’s control. His mother knows that he won’t shoot her, so the gun is as useless as a bouquet of flowers. “That’s not why you want me to help him, Jack.”

He closes his eyes, realizing the tactical disadvantage of taking his eyes off of everyone in the room, but he is so tired of battling his parents. He just wants someone to be on his side, just once.

“Long ago, you let the man I loved die,” Jack’s voice is quiet but hard. He looks up to find Rose’s face contorting in horror, her mouth pressed into a thin line. “I don’t know if you had him killed. I don’t want to know because it won’t change the fact that he’s dead. I pushed him away for you and Father and he died. So you owe me.”

Seconds tick by as Rose’s face morphs into anguish.

“I didn’t—“ she gasps.

Relief pulses through Jack, surprising in its ferocity. He hadn’t realized how much the doubt had been eating him up, thinking that his mother might have had Joseph killed. He still isn’t certain if she’s lying now, but he chooses to accept her words. He wants to believe them.

“Regardless,” Jack repeats, “he’s dead because you and Father wouldn’t accept that I loved him. You owe me David.”

“Dr. Baker, please finish bandaging my son’s wrist,” Rose says, taking control of the situation. “I don’t know where David is, I promise.”

“Shepherd is in Gehenna prison,” Thomasina murmurs shamefully, eyes cast downward, “and so is William.”

“Excuse me? For how long?” Rose snaps.

“Almost two years.”

“Two years? Damn it, Silas,” Rose hisses his name like a curse. “Thomasina, you will take me to him now.”

“Your Majesty,” Thomasina keeps her voice quiet, “if Jack is correct about Andrew’s plans, we don’t know the depth of the conspiracy. You, Michelle, the child, you could all be in danger. I suggest—”

As if on cue, the evening sky lights up with an explosion. Jack rushes to the window and tries to calculate the distance. Thomasina is beside him in a second, mumbling under her breath, “Gehenna.”

“I think you’re right,” Jack replies just as the vibration of the explosion rumbles through the air. He turns to Rose and grasps her forearm. “You are going into the bunker with Michelle and Tamara. That child is as much an heir to the throne as David. You have to protect her.”

Rose stares at him. He shakes her slightly, “Mother.”

“Yes, Michelle and Tamara. I’ll take them to the bunker.” She’s always had the strength of a lion and she regains her composure in mere moments. “Thomasina, which cells are David and William in?”

“David is 25, William is 22.”

Dr. Baker finishes bandaging Jack’s wrist as Rose calls Michelle, telling her where to meet.

“Jack, now,” Rose commands from the doorway as Jack grabs his shirt and jacket, throwing them on and chases after her and the others.

Where the hallway splits, Michelle is waiting with Tamara and an armed guard.

“That explosion?” Michelle asks.

“I’ll explain in the bunker. We might be in danger,” Rose says.

“Jack,” Michelle lurches toward him, but Thomasina grabs her shoulder and pushes her down the hall before she can reach him.

“I’ll save him, Michelle, I promise,” Jack yells after her as she rounds the corner.

Rose looks at Jack for a moment and smiles, her eyes filling with tears right before she wraps her arms around his chest. He tenses and doesn’t hug her back, but his body feels warm and peaceful in her embrace.

Her breath is hot on his skin as she whispers into his ear, “Come back once you have him.”

She pulls away and hurries down the corridor, disappearing around the bend.

Jack misses the comfort of her arms instantly, but there is no time for sentiment. He heads down the opposite corridor with Dr. Baker running behind.

* * *

Jack raids the armory, strapping a semi-automatic sniper rifle across his chest, a handgun to each hip and bagging six grenades and four extra clips.

Dr. Baker eyes him skeptically. “I’m pretty sure they won’t let you into Gehenna with that much ammunition.”

“The prison is under attack. They’ll need me. There are sure to be casualties, are you—“

“Count me in,” he replies.

They hop into the doctor’s vehicle, Jack behind the wheel. He careens through the streets, oblivious to the frantic citizens hurrying into buildings to take cover after hearing the explosion. He thinks only of David and prays to God that he makes it in time.

The prison is a stark utilitarian structure, one story above ground and the other below. Each cell is fortified with two-foot walls of stone, giant metal doors and arching brick ceilings. It is a strong building, but the gaping hole blown into the eastern wall claims otherwise.

Jack hops out of the vehicle to the sound of gunfire reverberating deep inside of the prison. An army captain jogs toward him, eyes wide with surprise at the sight of the prince.

“Captain, report,” Jack demands.

The soldier doesn’t hesitate to follow his orders.

“Rebels are attacking the prison, just this wing. We think they are loyal to David Shepherd and are trying to free him. Two groups have already infiltrated, maybe a dozen men in total.”

“These men are attempting to kill Shepherd. They work for Andrew and William Cross. Are those your men?” Jack points to two soldiers who are dragging injured guards and prisoners from the rubble and the captain nods. “I need you to mobilize them immediately. We are going into that prison with two objectives: to save Shepherd and to prevent William Cross from escaping. Understood?”

The captain hesitates for a second before saluting rigidly, “Yes, Major Benjamin.”

The title sends of wave of focus and purpose through Jack. This is where he belongs, in command.

* * *

They slip into the prison, weapons raised in preparation. The gunfire grows louder as they turn into a secondary hallway. Jack makes a fist in the air, halting the men behind him and peers around the corner. Three men dressed in civilian clothing have barricaded themselves at the far end of the hallway and are firing down an adjacent corridor. Jack can’t see who they are firing at, but he presumes that it is the military prison guards.

Jack turns to the three soldiers behind him. “Three enemy insurgents at the end of the hallway. You,” he points to the captain, “take the one on the left, I’ll take the two on the right. Now.”

Jack drops onto the stone floor and rolls into the hallway, peering through his scope and breathing out. He clips the first man through the side of the neck and the second through the head. The captain fires two shots and Jack gazes past his scope to verify the kills.

When he rises, he sees the horror in the captain’s eyes. Jack knows that look. The captain has never killed anyone before.

Jack places a hand on his shoulder, “Good shooting. Come on.”

Hurrying down the hallway, they stop before the turn. Jack nods at the captain to speak.

“This is Captain Wilson. Identify yourselves please.”

“Captain,” a voice answers, “it’s Lieutenant Parsons.”

Wilson turns to Jack. “He’s one of ours and a friend.”

Jack still rounds the corner cautiously, his rifle aimed and ready. There are two soldiers peering around the stone corners of the next hallway thirty feet away, their guns pointed at the ground. Jack loosens his hold on the weapon and strides toward them.

“Lieutenant, was it just you two holding this position?”

“Yes, sir,” the lieutenant replies.

“You did a great job,” Jack says. “I need you to continue to hold this position at all costs.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Captain Wil—“ Jack is cut off as more enemy combatants fire on them. He jumps behind the protection of the stone walls and sighs in relief to see all five men alive and behind cover, waiting for his instructions.

“Hold them off,” Jack says over the gunshots. “I’ll check on Shepherd.”

He runs down the hallway, turning right and descending the stone stairs to the prison’s basement. It is dank and dark, the lights flickering slightly as Jack takes each corner cautiously, but he never encounters anyone alive, only a few dead prison guards. This portion of the prison is still intact, the steel doors closed and locked. Sometimes he hears faint voices as he passes a cell, but he focuses only on the descending cell numbers.

_32, 31, 30._

A single gunshot slices through the air, followed by a strangled cry. Jack charges forward, rounding the corner, his leg muscles burning.

He rushes through the open doorway of cell 25, desperate and ready to kill.

David is kneeling on the stone floor, panting and pointing a handgun at another man, who is clutching his chest and falling against the wall. Jack gasps in relief and David swivels the weapon toward the sound, eyes wild and filled with adrenaline.

“It’s me,” Jack says letting the rifle sag in his hands. “It’s okay.”

David falls into a heap and groans. The other man is still dying, blood bubbling out of his mouth. The bullet obviously hit a lung and the sound is horrible. Jack considers shooting him in the head as an act of mercy but he doesn’t want to attract more attention with another gunshot.

There is another body lying motionless between David and the dying man, blood pouring from a wound in his neck, a handmade shiv next to him.

Blood is everywhere, flowing across the stone and covering David’s hands and shirt.

“They were trying to take me away,” David says still shaking from the adrenaline, “but they weren’t guards or soldiers.”

“They were going to kill you,” Jack replies, his hand outstretched toward David. The man with the gunshot wound convulses, blood spurting from his mouth as his body slouches onto the floor.

“I know. God warned me last night in a dream,” David says quietly, eyes hollow. He can't seem to focus on anything other than the dying man, so Jack turns to watch the open cell door. “I spent the entire day making a weapon. Without it, I would have lost.”

“I guess it’s good to have God on your side.” Jack bends down and rests a hand on David’s shoulder. He keeps his voice calm despite his fear of another attack. “Are you injured?”

David’s eyes glaze over. “Just some bruises. I caught a couple fists.”

Jack smiles in relief. He arrived too late, but thankfully David hadn’t needed him. He’d fought and killed two armed men with only his hands and a sharpened toothbrush.

Jack needs to get him moving. He needs to break him out of this post-violence trance, so he grabs the basin of water from the table and sets it on the ground.

“Wash your hands,” he says gently and David complies like a child. David has killed before but never with such intimacy.

“Sorry,” David whispers after his hands are clean, looking up at Jack. “I’m okay.”

“I know,” Jack replies, even though David is as far from okay as Jack has ever seen him. “Your shirt is covered in blood. Take it off. Wear my jacket."

David does as he’s told, his movements slow and purposeful.

“We need to go,” Jack says. “You’re still in danger.”

“Why is your dad trying to kill me again?” David asks, standing and picking up the handgun he’d used to shoot the man, regaining some of his composure.

“He’s not. I’m afraid it’s my uncle and his psycho son this time.”

David furrows his brow and reaches for Jack’s bandaged wrist. “What happen—“

“No time,” Jack says, dragging David to the door. “William is three cells down. If he hasn’t escaped yet, we have to stop him.”

Together they peer down either side of the hallway, guns raised.

“Clear,” David says.

“I’m clear too. Let’s go.”

He can see that the door is open and loses hope as he enters William’s cell. Empty. David slides in next to him, keeping his gun pointed toward the doorway.

“Damn it,” Jack kicks the wooden table sending the wash basin crashing to the ground. “We have to get out now.”

Jack raises his rifle and steps out of the door. A bullet whizzes down the hallway and David pulls him back.

“Shit,” Jack hisses, dropping onto the ground. He switches to a handgun and pokes his head into the hallway. He manages to take out two insurgents at the end of the corridor before the others start to fire back.

“How many?” David asks.

“Six? Eight?”

“This isn’t bad. We can easily shoot anyone who tries to come down the hallway.”

“But we’re trapped,” Jack mutters, firing a few more shots that ricochet wildly off the stone walls and miss their marks. He sits against the wall just inside the cell, out of harm’s way and studies David as he sits across from him. David is present in the moment, a soldier who is ready and willing to fight, but something is still off about him. His fingers keep twitching on his gun and his face grows pained whenever he thinks that Jack isn’t looking at him.

He’s still thinking about those two men he had to kill.

“Cousin,” Andrew’s voice singsongs, echoing through the corridor. Jack grips David’s arm tightly, pushing him further into the room, instinctively trying to protect him with his own body.

Andrew sounds far away, at the end of the hall. He’s not a soldier or brave, so Jack doesn’t expect him to come charging into the room, guns blazing. But he might have used his father’s money to buy scores of soldiers who are brave…or stupid, which is generally more dangerous than bravery.

Jack takes a deep breath, leveling his voice before replying, “We have to stop meeting in prison, dearest cousin.”

Andrew chuckles wickedly, “I knew that with the right incentive you could break out of that palace suite. I didn’t want to waste this little show just on Shepherd.”

“What little show is that?” Jack asks inching forward, peering into the badly-lit hallway. The enemy combatants have all taken cover.

“The show of killing your boyfriend.”

“Well, I’m sorry, but you didn’t succeed. Did you think Shepherd was weak, like you?”

Andrew laughs again, loving that he has the upper hand. “I’ll admit, he is scrappier than I expected. I understand what you see in him now.”

“He’s stalling,” David whispers.

“I know,” Jack whispers back. “What do you want to do? Make a run for it?”

David shakes his head, surveying the walls and ceiling, thinking.

They’re trapped, sitting ducks waiting for the slaughter if Andrew has men who are planning to storm this cell. It’s time to go on the offensive.

Jack grabs a grenade from the bag that is slung over his shoulder, pulls the pin and throws it down the corridor. The explosion booms through the hallway, too weak to destroy a wall, but Jack is hoping only to destroy his cousin.

“You came prepared,” Andrew yells in the silence afterward. “Was that your only grenade?”

“Of course not.”

“How many more?”

“Wouldn’t you love to know?” Jack yells.

“No, it really doesn’t concern me. You’re the one who is going to die down here, not me.”

Jack hears quiet arguing, Andrew’s voice and someone else’s, but he can’t make out the words. There is shuffling and then the clanking of metal on stone.

“Jack?” It’s William’s voice, slightly out of breath and not smug like Andrew.

“Uncle?” Jack yells.

“I’m sorry,” William says. “This wasn’t the plan. My son has an impulse control problem and he’s wanted you dead for a while. But I didn’t want you to be here for this.”

“That’s so thoughtful of you,” Jack yells.

“You’re family,” William responds. “If you come out now and leave Shepherd, we won’t shoot you.”

Jack shakes his head and stares at David. His pants are splattered with blood and his hands are white as they grip his gun. They are going to die here. The realization hits Jack suddenly and with absolute certainty, almost like a message from God. Andrew had clearly been taunting him with his words, but Jack _is_ glad that he is here with David right now. If death is coming for them he doesn’t want David to face it alone.

“Even if I believed that you wouldn’t shoot me, which I don’t,” Jack yells, taking David’s left hand in his and smiling at him, “I wouldn’t leave.”

“Not for anything,” he adds quietly, only for David’s ears.

David tightens his grip on Jack’s hand and smiles weakly. “You’re crazy.”

“I’m sorry to hear that, Jack. I guess this is goodbye,” William shouts. Jack can hear footsteps clicking away, down the stone floor until there is nothing.

An eerie silence descends on the prison. Jack pulls out the second handgun and slides farther into the cell, next to David, keeping his body on the ground. He points one weapon at the door, setting the other between them for easy access. He waits, the anticipation of violence always worse than the violence itself.

There is no sound except David’s harsh breathing and the thumping of his own heart. The silence stretches for dozens of seconds as Jack counts each one, waiting for William’s men to storm the room.

The first explosion comes from the right, near David’s cell.

“Shit,” Jack rushes forward and pushes the metal door closed as a second closer explosion rocks the building, dust raining from the ceiling onto his head.

He doesn’t feel David’s hand on his arm, but he is suddenly being pulled backward as David pushes him under the bed and rolls in next to him.

The third explosion comes from the hallway just outside their cell, blowing the inner wall in as the brick ceiling over the door caves in. David wraps his arm around Jack, pushing him against the wall and cradling Jack’s head against his chest. He fully expects to be crushed, wonders if it will be a quick death or if he’ll be trapped and left to bleed internally for hours.

The debris settles slowly, a few errant bricks and stones cascading downward until the world is finally quiet and dusty. David rolls out from under the bed and pulls Jack with him, covering his mouth with his jacket.

“Are you okay?” David asks.

Jack sits up, patting down his torso. When he tries to stands his head swims and he falls back onto the bed.

“Jack,” David rushes to his side, “did you get hit? Are you injured?”

Jack sways, feels the world tilting and grabs David’s arm for support.

“No, just weak. I was on a hunger strike for the past two days.”

“Oh,” David runs his fingers gently down Jack’s left forearm. “What happened to your wrist?”

By his tone he already knows, but maybe he doesn’t understand why Jack did it, that it wasn’t an earnest suicide attempt.

“I had to get out of prison quickly. I didn’t have many options.”

“Jack—“

“Can we talk about it later? We have a few more immediate problems than my wrist or my hunger.”

David nods, but from the concern on his face, Jack knows that he doesn’t plan to drop the subject for good.

The lights flicker and go out, plunging them into darkness, as a few more bricks roll down the pile.

They walk the perimeter of the cell together, searching for any rays of light, any indication that the rubble field isn’t meters thick. Everywhere Jack looks, only darkness greets him.

“We’re trapped and I can’t see a fucking thing,” Jack says, punching the wall.

Hopelessness is just beginning to constrict around his heart when there is a banging on the stone wall from the adjacent cell, like someone is hitting it from the other side. The wall begins to crumble, but in the blackness Jack can’t be certain if the whole wall is about to go or just a section. He grabs David’s hand, pulling him to the other side of the cell, worried that it might be William and Andrew, coming to finish them off.

The bright beam of a flashlight shines through the hole in the wall, blinding them and Jack raises his hand instinctively before realizing he isn’t holding his gun anymore. He squints into the light.

The flashlight tilts up, shining on the ceiling, bathing everything in a soothing yellow glow. An old man with grey hair and an oddly familiar face pops his head through the hole in the wall, mouth tilted in a smile.

“Looks like you are both dead men like me,” the man says. It’s a joke, not a threat.

David lets out a breath of relief. “Vesper? It’s nice to finally meet you in person.”

“Despite the circumstances, I agree, Mr. Shepherd.”

Vesper? As in King Vesper Abaddon? A man who supposedly died thirty years ago?

Jack’s mouth falls open, “What the fuck?”


	18. Consign me not to darkness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First off: Huge, massive thanks to marlowe_tops who beta-read this thing twice, because it desperately needed it and she went above and beyond!
> 
> Chapter title from "Broken Crown" by Mumford & Sons.

“You two know each other?” Jack asks.

“Just a conversation through a wall once,” David replies. “Vesper, how does it look in your cell?”

Vesper pokes his head in and looks around. “Better than this one. There is an opening, small, but if we remove a few stones, I think we can get out.”

“Great.” David sounds oddly chipper about digging a dictator out of prison.

Jack retrieves his handguns, but the rifle is lost in the rubble. He follows David through the hole and surveys Vesper’s cell. The front door is twisted and most of the wall is collapsed, but there is a small opening and a noticeable draft.

David claps a hand on his shoulder. “Sit down for a second, until your head stops spinning.”

“I can help,” Jack replies even as the world tilts and he sags onto Vesper’s bed.

“What’s wrong with him?” Vesper asks.

“Hunger strike and blood loss.” There is an edge of anger to David’s voice on the last two words.

Vesper shuffles over to his desk, grabbing a chocolate bar and shoving it in Jack’s face. He wants to refuse the gift, but his stomach won’t let him.

“Where’d you get the flashlight and the chocolate?” Jack asks, scowling at Vesper and peeling away the wrapper.

“You’d be surprised what a man can accumulate after 32 years, even in prison.”

Jack nods. “Like a television, pictures of the family? It’s homey in here.”

Vesper quirks his head, contemplating Jack. “I’ve heard a lot about you over the years, boy. You’re not what I imagined.”

“You heard about me? From my father?” Jack inquires. “So, he’s kept you in prison for three decades as what, an advisor?”

“Being king is the loneliest job on Earth,” Vesper responds. “Your father needed an ear.”

“No wonder he’s turned into such an asshole if he’s taking advice from you.”

“Are you two going to fight the entire time?” David is panting and sweaty as he pulls bricks from the pile.

“Probably,” Jack replies, handing a square of chocolate to Vesper. Jack leans back, sucking chocolate from his thumb and watching David bend down to move some bricks. David’s pants are pulled tight across his ass, perfectly accentuating the swell of each cheek.

Manual labor definitely agrees with David’s hard, lean body.

A few more bricks and they should be able to shimmy out. Vesper’s gut won’t fit through the hole but that might be an advantage. Maybe Jack and David can brick the asshole back in after they escape.

“One time, I told your father that he should have you hanged,” Vesper says sardonically.

“Oh really? When was that?”

“There was a trial and you turned against him.”

“He probably regrets not taking that advice,” Jack mumbles as David tests the hole, trying to squeeze through.

“Jack,” David calls, “it’s big enough for us, but I need help moving that large stone so Vesper can get out too.”

Maybe the explosions destroyed Jack’s hearing because there is no way David just said that.

“I elect not to move that boulder and escape without this bastard,” Jack replies, crossing the cell and feeling slightly better after the chocolate bar.

Vesper smiles. “You truly are your father’s son.”

A genocidal king is judging _him_? Jack cocks his head and sucks on his teeth. He pulls the handgun from its holster and starts to raise it. Vesper doesn’t even flinch.

David pounces on Jack, forcefully holding down his arm. “Stop.”

“This man slaughtered his own people and you’re going to help him escape because you had a conversation through a wall once?”

“It was the night before I was to be executed and the conversation helped.”

“That wipes away everything else?”

David looks at Vesper, standing next to his bed like a kindly old grandpa. The façade doesn’t fool Jack for a second.

“He owes me,” David says with a shrug. “I gave him my steak.”

“And it was delicious. Thank you.”

David pries the gun from Jack’s hand and slides it back into the holster. “Help me move that stone.”

“Fine,” Jack says, glaring at Vesper. There will be plenty of opportunities to kill him later.

It takes their combined strength, but they manage to push the stone aside and slip through the opening. David assists Vesper while Jack glowers. Is David ever going to stop trusting asshole kings?

“Silas used to enter the prison from a secret passage in the back,” Vesper says to David. “He didn’t want people to wonder why he was always dropping by Gehenna.”

“And how would you know about a secret passage?” Jack asks.

“Dear boy,” Vesper replies, “I’ve been in prison longer than you’ve been alive. I watched your father age. I watched him grow increasingly disappointed in you, and increasingly paranoid.”

“Charming.” Jack smirks. “But the question was how the hell do you know about secret passageways.”

“Your father told me himself. These past few years he’s grown distrustful of everyone, so in need of a friend that he turned to me. Not because he trusts me but because he thinks that he controls me.”

Despite his better judgment, Jack believes Vesper. In their last meeting, Silas had seemed desperate to control Jack by any means. Weak and afraid.

“We need to move,” David says. “If there is a way for us to get out, then William and Andrew can get back in.”

Jack nods, still studying Vesper. The chocolate bar was admittedly a nice gesture, but it won’t stop Jack from putting a bullet through his brain the second his usefulness wears out.

* * *

Vesper gets turned around a few times, having pieced together the layout of the prison through multiple conversations with Silas, but eventually they find the door that he absolutely insists leads to the secret passageway. It looks just like the other 20 doors they passed while Vesper muttered to himself and scratched his head in confusion.

Maybe he isn’t a criminal mastermind trying to lead them into a trap. Maybe he is just an old man with stage two dementia leading them in circles.

“I don’t suppose that in addition to flashlights and chocolate bars, you also have the key?” Jack asks after trying the door handle. Vesper smiles and doesn’t answer.

“We could blow it,” David suggests. “It will attract attention, but I don’t see any other way.”

“It’s worth a shot. We can take cover behind that wall.”

David and Vesper crouch behind the wall as Jack places the grenade, pulls the pin and runs.

As the dust of the explosion settles, Jack peers around the corner and laughs. The door is a mangled mess, easily pushed aside. David does the honors as Vesper points his flashlight through the doorway and Jack points his gun.

“Great. More tunnel,” Jack mutters, letting the gun drop to his side.

“This is good actually,” David states as they resume walking. “This might mean that the tunnel leads outside of the prison gates.”

They encounter another door, which Jack blows away, followed by more tunnel. It seems like a trick, like Vesper is leading them on a wild goose chase, but David is hopeful and trusting as always.

“You know, I only have three more grenades, so we aren’t going to be able to follow this tunnel all of the way to the Antipodes or wherever the hell it goes.”

The aged king simply chuckles, growing more buoyant with each step. He is almost hysterical in his glee, which makes the skin on Jack’s neck crawl. This has to be a trap.

The tunnel rises before the third door, ascending at least thirty feet.

“Maybe this is the last one,” David says, placing a palm on the metal door and closing his eyes as if in prayer.

“There’s no cover here,” Jack observes. “We can’t use a grenade. The metal is strong, but this door handle is a piece of shit. I can just shoot it out.”

“Are you sure the bullets won’t ricochet?” David asks.

Jack presses his ear against the door and knocks. “It’s hollow. Should be fine, but step back anyway.”

“You’re more capable than your father gives you credit for,” Vesper says to Jack with a tilt of his head, like he’s just discovered some long-hidden truth.

Jack glares and steps toward him. “Do you ever shut up?”

He turns back to the door, squints and unleashes a volley of bullets into the lock and handle, draining the rest of his clip and switching to a new one. If they are any guards in the vicinity, they’ll be ambushed immediately.

With a deep breath, he kicks the door open and is greeted by the sight of the full moon ascending over a copse of trees and a lonely dirt road with no one on it.

Vesper pushes past him and raises his palms to the sky. “Thank you.”

* * *

 “You know,” Vesper says after they make their way into the forest, “everyone probably thinks you’re dead right now, David.”

Jack is walking behind them, trying to figure out when and how to kill the king. David keeps getting in the way, walking beside him as if they’re friends.

“As someone who’s been dead for 32 years, I feel it is my responsibility to say, ‘Take advantage of this opportunity.’”

“You mean there’s freedom in being dead?” David asks.

“Exactly.” Vesper stops and stares into the forest. “You can do anything you want, be anyone you want.”

“Go anywhere I want?” David asks.

The words are simply a continuation of Vesper’s, but they cause a plan to take hold in Jack’s mind. He is dead too and he can go anywhere he wants. This might be his only chance to make everything right and put David on the throne. He finally has the element of surprise on his side.

“So, David Shepherd, now that you’re dead, what are you going to do?” Vesper takes a deep breath and continues, “I am going to enjoy the smell of the forest and then maybe go to the beach. I used to love the beach.”

“Someday, am I going to regret helping you?” David asks.

Jack studies them, eyes darting from one king to the other. David never ceases to amaze him with his kindness, but he also has an annoying habit of making stupid decisions based on a bloated sense of honor.

And he is about to do it again.

“I don’t know,” Vesper replies with the quirk of an eyebrow. “But I wish you luck.”

He turns and heads into the forest. David is seriously letting him go?

“You gotta be kidding me,” Jack mutters, pulling his gun from its holster.

“Jack, no!”

David freezes mid-lunge as the shot fires, cracking through the night air. The sound that designates the before from the after.

With a cry, Vesper falls.

Jack doesn’t look at David as he walks through the underbrush toward the king. The bullet caught him in the upper back. The flashlight is on the ground next to him casting long shadows behind the trees.

Jack considers saying _I’m sorry_ because he is, but it sounds flippant, so he says nothing.

Twitching in pain, Vesper manages to roll over and stare at Jack. There is no fear or anger in his eyes, just surprise. Silas Benjamin hadn’t been strong enough to kill him, so it must seem odd that Silas’ failure of a son could do it.

Jack picks up the flashlight, points the gun at Vesper’s head and pulls the trigger. The stillness after death is always worse than the act itself. It can seep into a man’s soul and stop the world forever if he lets it.

David is a statue, hand clamped over his mouth, as Jack steps around him without looking him in the eyes. He can’t. He knows what he will see there, the mirror of his own feelings.

“We have to go,” he says without pausing, making his way through the brush, thankful for the flashlight.

Eventually he hears David footsteps behind him, faster than his as he tries to catch up. He doesn’t look back or slow down. He doesn’t see David’s anger until it is slamming into his back, sending him crashing into a tree, the flashlight falling from his hand.

“What the hell were you thinking?”

“It had to be done.” Jack’s voice is hollow, no inflection or emotion. “So, I did it.”

“It did not have to be done.” David is the opposite pole of their magnet, vibrating with anger and slightly out of control. “In case you didn’t notice, Vesper just saved our lives.”

“He might have known the way out, but he needed us to help him escape. He wasn’t being selfless.”

“You don’t know why he did it.”

“We have to keep moving.” Jack picks up the flashlight and continues walking, David trailing behind.

“He had been in prison for 30 years,” David says to his back. He just can’t let it go, can he? “Maybe he wasn’t the same man from the history books anymore. Maybe he’d changed.”

“He hadn’t changed,” Jack mutters, not turning back. He has to keep moving. If he stops, even for a second, he might start to feel. David obviously doesn’t understand because he grabs Jack’s shoulder and pulls him back, forces him to have this pointless conversation.

“He might have changed.” David’s voice is low now, almost breathy with emotion. It’s worse than his anger and it causes Jack’s tether to snap.

“That man was a megalomaniac and, more importantly, a king. You are a threat to every single person who has ever been king or ever wanted to be king. You can’t trust any of them.”

“You’re on that list.”

That’s a slap to the face. “You’re comparing me to Vesper Abaddon?”

“Don’t do that,” David replies. “You know that there was a time when you wanted to be king so badly you aligned yourself with William. By your estimation, you should be on the list of people I can’t trust.”

“But I love you. If Vesper happened to be in love with you, I’d take back what I said about him.”

David rolls his eyes. “You are living proof that people can change. You aren’t the man I met three years ago.”

“Yes I am.”

David grabs his right forearm a bit too roughly, his palm hot against Jack’s skin. “When I met you, trying to destroy me was your favorite pastime. You threw my brother, Ethan, to the wolves and almost got him killed. You willingly participated in the trial against me.”

David’s eyes are burning with so much intensity that Jack has to look away. He’s too fucking idealistic for his own good.

“And now,” David continues, “I trust you more than I trust anybody because you changed.”

“I hate to burst your bubble, but I’m the same person I’ve always been. The thing that changed was that you went from being a nuisance to being someone I love.”

“You are not the same man I met. Please don’t sell yourself short like that.”

Jack wrenches his arm from David’s grasp, palming his forehead in frustration. He wishes that he could jump ahead into the future and stop having this fucking conversation. Why the hell does David have to talk about everything? Why can’t he just let it slip into the past without a goddamn debrief?

“I’m sorry if you thought that I defended you in court because of some noble reason, like being unable to send an innocent man to his death. I saved you because I loved you, even back then. Yes, you were innocent of treason, but that wasn’t why I saved you.”

“No. You also wanted to do what was right.” David sounds like he doesn’t quite believe the words, like he’s putting them into the world so they will become the truth.

“Please believe me when I say that if I hadn’t loved you, I would have let my father execute you. If I didn’t love you right now and I still wanted to be king, I would shoot you in the back.”

David’s eyes lose focus and he looks like he’s teetering between horror and disbelief.

“That’s why I killed him,” Jack says. “He was the King of Carmel, so he couldn’t be trusted.”

“He was an old man who’d lost half of his life to a prison cell. And he saved us, regardless of his reason. You heard him; he wanted to do harmless things like go to the beach.”

It’s odd. This idealistic hope is one of the things that Jack loves most about David, but it is also frustrating beyond words.

“You’re right. That’s all he wanted _tonight._ But eventually, he was going to want your head on a pike just like the rest of them.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I do know,” Jack says, accentuating each word, “and that's why I shot him.”

David’s disappointment is obvious, but there is something else behind his eyes, something worse. Disgust.

Jack’s chest constricts. He has always known that David’s love was too good to be true. He had been waiting for this moment, when David would see his true nature and turn away in horror.

He’s going to lose him over this? Over killing Vesper Abaddon?

“I did this for you and now you hate me for it?” Jack can’t keep the quiver from his voice.

David stares at the ground, his face sunken and tired. Jack isn't even sure if David is listening or if he's too consumed by his own thoughts.

“You think I liked shooting an old man in the back?” Jack asks desperately when David continues to close in on himself, shutting Jack out. "David—"

“Please, just ...” David closes his eyes and turns away.

The world becomes blurry behind a veil of unshed tears and Jack pulls his arms around his chest. This is it. After every horrible thing he’s done to David, this is the thing that tips the scales? A necessary act of violence to keep David safe?

He waits through every excruciating second, as numbness takes hold until there is nothing. And still David stands with his hand pressed against a tree, his head bowed in thought, until Jack swings back around into anger.

Vesper had to die and David has no right to make him feel guilty about this.

“If I could go back to that moment, I would shoot Vesper again,” Jack says, his voice sounding too loud after the minutes of silence.

“Jack—“

“I would shoot him a thousand times because it had to be done, and I knew you wouldn’t fucking do it.”

David doesn’t respond. He doesn’t continue to argue that Vesper deserved a second chance or that he could be trusted, so that’s progress.

But he keeps staring at the ground as he leans against a tree.

“Fucking look at me!” Jack yells.

Slowly, as if it’s causing him physical pain, David turns and looks at Jack. His expression is beyond unreadable. Jack has no idea what David is thinking and it feels disorienting, like falling and not knowing which way is up.

“I know it’s not pretty, but I would do anything to protect you,” Jack says. “And if you are going to become the King of Gilboa, you can’t let the old kings walk free.”

David rubs his hand across his face and looks like he despises Jack’s words, but he doesn’t argue. He might wish to build his kingdom on a foundation of only mercy, no brutality or death, but that is a wish that can never be granted. No king has ever ascended to a throne without getting a little blood on his hands.

“I won’t apologize for what I’ve done,” Jack continues. “And I won’t promise that I will never kill anyone else for you, because I will if I have to.”

David runs a hand through his hair wearily.

“And if that makes you hate me, so be it.”

“I don’t hate you," David responds, his tone matter-of-fact as if the thought is absurd. The admission calms Jack enough that he can think rationally once again. Maybe David just needs space.

“Do you want me to go?”

“What? Why?” David still seems slightly lost, like the world and Jack don’t make sense.

“Do you want to be alone?” Jack asks. “I can leave.”

David steps forward and takes the flashlight from Jack without touching him.

“I don't want you to leave.” David stands in front of him like a pendulum at the top of its arc, out of equilibrium but temporarily at rest.

Jack watches the battle behind David’s eyes as he tries to decide whether he should go to Jack or simply turn and continue walking. It takes all of Jack’s strength to resist reaching for him. He wants David to touch him, not the other way around.

“We should keep moving,” David finally says and Jack closes his eyes to hide his pain. “We both need to eat and people might be looking for us.”

Jack nods, shivering slightly, but whether it’s from the brisk night air or from the sound of David’s footsteps as he turns to walk away, Jack isn’t certain.

* * *

They walk for half of an hour through the woods without speaking. Jack learned how to count time during his days in the military. He counts it now to keep his mind at rest, to wash away the image of Vesper’s eyes going glassy as the bullet went through his brain.

They are still in the suburbs of Shiloh, so eventually the trees dissolve into a row of houses. Jack doesn’t have a watch, but he assumes that it is around ten o’clock based on how many homes are still lit up.

David stops in front of one house, peering at the flat screen television in the living room. It is full of images of the hollowed out remains of Gehenna, rescue workers carefully trying to pick through the rubble, and battered bodies being loaded into ambulances. Headlines crawl past the bottom of the screen.

**Rebels attack Gehenna. Dozens missing and feared dead.**

**Tensions mount in the north as Ekron soldiers fire on refugees.**

**King Silas remains in Gilgal, vowing to save the citizens of Prosperity.**

“Your father is staying in the north?” David says. “It must be bad up there. I wonder if Ezra found my family.”

“He’s a good soldier. I’m sure he did.”

David worries his hands together. “What about Tamara?”

“She’s safe. Michelle took her to the bunker. It’s secure.”

“Thank you, Jack,” David whispers. After their conversation in the woods, Jack is just pleased to know that David can still express gratitude toward him.

“Do you think William will…?” David trails off but Jack knows how the sentence ends.

“William won’t hurt them. With you ‘dead,’ Silas would be his main target now.”

“We should eat.” David comes back from his trance. “That house over there. No cars. Dark inside. No one is home.”

“You want to break in and steal food?” Jack stumbles after David as he strides across the lawn suddenly full of purpose.

“If we go to a store, we’ll be recognized and captured. I’ll reimburse the owners as soon as I can.”

David breaks the window in the back door, listening for a dog before turning the latch and entering.

“Have you done this before?”

“Of course not but I’ve seen it in plenty of movies,” David almost smiles, not quite but close, and it fills Jack with relief. Maybe they will be okay again someday, able to smile and laugh together.

They raid the pantry, going for the junk food. Jack guzzles an entire glass of orange juice in one go. It helps. His brain was beginning to feel fuzzy, but now he can think.

“So where do you want to go now that you’re dead?” Jack asks.

David munches on a few tortilla chips, contemplating. “If Tamara is safe, then I want to go north, make sure the rest of my family is okay. I want to help the refugees if I can. I’ve known some of them my entire life.”

Of course David wants to use this opportunity to help people, whereas Jack wants to use it to take down Silas.

No wonder God chose David to be king, but it doesn’t mean that there isn’t a higher purpose for Jack. God needs him to be the person David can’t be, so that David can remain clean. Jack’s soul is already tarnished; what difference will a few more deaths make?

“Then we should head north,” Jack says, accepting what God is asking of him, “and make sure your family and friends are safe.”

David writes down the address of this house and shoves it in his pocket. He really is going to send them an envelope of money to pay for the window and the food. Even in thievery, he’s so adorably honorable.

“We’ll need a vehicle,” David says as they stroll down the quiet lane. “What do you think of that one?”

David wanders over to an old Chevy truck and tries the door. It’s a piece of junk so Jack isn’t surprised that the doors aren’t locked.

“It looks…rugged,” Jack replies. “But you do realize people don’t actually leave the keys above the visor.”

“No problem, get in.”

Jack slides into the passenger seat as David gets behind the wheel.

“Give me your gun.”

Jack does, quirking an eyebrow in confusion. David bashes the gun’s handle into the truck’s ignition until the wires are exposed. He pulls a set of scissors from his pocket.

“Where did you get those?”

“From that house,” David replies as if the answer should be obvious. Jack hadn’t seen him pocket the scissors. Maybe David is secretly a kleptomaniac. It would be refreshing if he had a real vice apart from being too noble.

“Do you actually know what you’re doing?”

David bites his bottom lip as he cuts a few wires and then taps them together. The engine sputters and rumbles to life.

He smirks at Jack, who is feeling oddly turned on. “I used to work on cars with my dad.”

“Really?”

“You may think you know everything about me, Benjamin, but I’ve got a few surprises up my sleeve.” He puts the truck into gear and pulls onto the road.

“You know, I think you like bad boys because you’re secretly one of them,” Jack observes and David almost smiles, one side of his mouth tilting upward. It’s progress.

* * *

Jack jerks awake, thinking he is still in prison and starts to panic.

“Jack?”

He peers over and sees David behind the wheel of the truck.

His head has finally stopped pounding.

“How long was I out?”

“A few hours. Feel better?”

“Yeah.” He rests his head on the seat, closing his eyes.

“How’s your wrist?” David asks.

“It’s fine.”

“How much blood did you lose?”

Jack groans in annoyance. “I don’t know. I didn’t bottle it to find out.”

“Jack—“ David’s voice has that _we need to talk_ tone again.

“It was no big deal.”

David’s body tenses and he swerves onto a dirt road, slamming the brakes.

“Holy fuck, David.” Jack gasps as the seatbelt constricts across his chest.

“What were you thinking?” David asks, unclasping his seatbelt and turning to Jack. David looks tired and worn out, like he’s spent the past few hours lost in his mind and it wasn’t a happy place.

Jack closes his eyes. “Andrew sent me a message claiming he was going to kill you. There are only two surefire ways to get out of prison, try to kill yourself or try to kill somebody else. I was the only one in my prison.”

“So, you tried to kill yourself?”

Jack shakes his head and stares straight ahead. “I kept the cuts shallow. I wasn’t actually trying to die.”

“But you could have. Your plan was cavalier at best.”

“Come on. That was exactly the type of thing you would have done. Do you not recall how we met? You jumped in front of a fucking tank. Remember?”

The tension breaks and David chuckles, covering his mouth in a futile attempt to keep it in. It causes a wave a relief to rush through Jack, knowing that David can still laugh with him after what happened in the woods.

“I might have a vague recollection of that,” David grins.

“Yeah. Nothing I do will ever beat it.”

“Fine. Maybe we should both stop being so cavalier.”

“But where’s the fun in that?” Jack says, biting his bottom lip.

With a faint smile, David unclasps Jack’s seatbelt and runs his knuckles lightly across the top of Jack’s left hand. It is the first time David has touched him since their fight in the woods and Jack’s body sags as he lets out a breath.

David must also feel the enormity of the gesture, because his face grows solemn as he lightly drags his knuckles up Jack’s arm, past his bandaged wrist and across the fabric of his t-shirt, finally coming to rest on the side of Jack’s neck. Jack leans into the touch, taking David’s hand in his and lightly kissing his palm.

“Seriously, Jack, if I lost you…”

Jack’s body feels warm from David’s touch. “You still love me?”

David looks confused. “Yes.”

Jack laces their fingers together and explains, “After what happened, I didn’t know.”

David shakes his head and cups his hand behind Jack’s head.

“Jack, of course I love you,” he whispers, before leaning forward for a kiss.

Jack closes his eyes and loses himself to David's lips. He knows that they aren't completely okay yet, but for the first time since they left the woods, he thinks that they will be, eventually.


	19. Stand me up at the gates of Hell

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Title from "I won't back down" by Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers. Thank you to marlowe_tops for an awesome beta as always.

The Sun is just beginning to rise over the trees along the meadow as Jack turns onto the gravel parking lot, south of the Prosperity River. They’d switched drivers in the night, but David had been too agitated to sleep at first. Payphones were hard to come by and even when they found one, he could never get through to his family or his men.

Jack had been agitated for a different reason. He’d known William long enough not to underestimate him. In many ways he was more powerful than the king, because he had money. He didn’t need to inspire people to follow him. He could simply pay them.

Sometime around three o’clock David had finally drifted off as Jack told stories about growing up in the palace. His life had been so different from David’s, whose tales were of brotherly mischief, tractor races, and county fairs in which people voted on livestock. To Jack, it seemed an absurd childhood compared to endless balls and private tutors.

Finally in the predawn, Jack had reached Ezra Mason, the man charged with saving David’s family, on a gas station payphone. At first he’d wanted to shake David awake and tell him the good news, but he had looked so peaceful in sleep. So Jack decided to surprise him.

Now in the early morning light, Jack stops the truck and rolls down the window as Ezra approaches the car with an M24 sniper rifle slung across his back.

“Major Benjamin,” Ezra says softly propping his forearms in the open window. “You have no idea how happy I was when you called. It’s all over the news that sleeping beauty over there is presumed dead.”

“Yeah?” Jack replies. “Sorry about that but acting like we were dead gave us a chance to escape.”

Jessie Shepherd comes jogging across the meadow, looking disheveled but joyful as she peers into the truck. She raps loudly on the window and David’s entire body jumps. His eyes are red and fuzzy as he turns to look out the window.

“Mom.” It’s more of a gasp than a word as he wrestles with his seatbelt and finally throws the door open.

He collides with his mother as she presses her face to his chest. It strikes Jack as odd that there are families who act like this in the real world, with outward displays of affection.

“Oh no,” Jack mutters as he gets out of the truck. David’s brothers are bounding out of the forest and across the grassy expanse.

Even odder is the way the Shepherd brothers express their love. Abe pulls David into a headlock that looks more like a fight than a hug while Sean pokes at his ribs. David’s other brothers are here as well, the ones whom Jack has never met, Robert and Owen. But he’s heard about them. Robert is short and quiet and loves strawberry ice cream. Owen played football in high school and has a tattoo for his father. Jack has no idea why he remembers these stupid details from David’s stories.

“You look good for a dead man,” Robert laughs while David tries in vain to escape Abe’s headlock.

Jack leans against the truck to watch the reunion unfold. It’s more like a band of Neanderthals than men. Is it because of their upbringing or is this how brothers always act? Had he known his half-brother, Seth, would he have treated him this way or would he have tried to feed him poison?

David finally manages to push them off with a smile.

“We heard about the prison,” Abe says.

“How the hell did you get out of there?” Robert asks, wrapping an arm around his little brother.

David’s gaze flits over to Jack.

“You can thank him.” He points at Jack and every pair of eyes rolls around to look at him. Jack folds his arms across his chest, slightly uncomfortable under their scrutiny. “He saved me.”

“Hardly.” Jack shakes his head, but Sean is already stalking toward him.

Sean fucking Shepherd. The brother who made Jack’s life hell when they were all in Gath. The one who was convinced that Jack was worse than a snake in the Garden of Eden, out to corrupt his innocent little brother. In hindsight, maybe that concern had been valid.

“Benjamin,” Sean says, punching him lightly on the shoulder. Jack stands up straighter, ready to go to battle.

“Troglodyte,” Jack smirks, earning a chuckle from David.

“Thanks for saving our baby brother,” Sean replies, promptly punching Jack in the shoulder a second time.

What a fucking moron. Jack tilts his head, glaring at Sean through his lashes.

“You’re welcome,” he replies with a light uppercut to Sean’s ribs. He’s ready for the blowback, for an all-out fight but Sean simply holds his battered ribs and laughs.

“You know, you’re all right, Benjamin,” he says.

“I’m aware.”

How David and Sean came from the same family, Jack will never understand.

The playful exuberance of the Shepherd men melts into quietude as their mother steps through them and stops in front of the former prince. Everything turns still and peaceful.

“Mrs. Shepherd,” Jack says, stealing a quick glance at David whose eyes look drowsy with joy.

Her face is blank as she grabs Jack’s right elbow and looks up at him. He’s expecting a _thank you_ or maternal words of wisdom. But instead, the corners of her mouth tilt up and she blinks slowly like a contented cat, saying nothing.

Jack smiles and nods. He doesn’t need the words. He understands.

“David,” Jessie says, releasing Jack and turning to her son.

“Yeah?”

“I don’t mean to cast a shadow on this reunion.” At these words the atmosphere in the Shepherd clan shifts again, growing dark. “But there are still thousands of people stuck on the other side of the river.”

“What?”

Ezra slides into Jack’s field of view, his expression grave.

“The king is transporting the refugees across the Kish Bridge fifty miles to the east. But there are about 5,000 people who got cut off from the main group. Ekron forces are in their way.”

“Where are they?” David asks.

“Right across the river,” Ezra responds.

“That’s the group we were with,” Jessie explains, finally stepping away from Jack and moving to her son’s side. “It’s mostly people from Port Prosperity.”

She trails off, choosing to let the consequences of that statement hang in the air. These are David’s neighbors and schoolmates, people he’s known his entire life.

“Is the king doing anything?” Jack asks.

Ezra shakes his head. “Intelligence is a bit hard to come by, so I don’t know where the king is. He had been overseeing the rescue until last night but he’s not there anymore.”

“Damn,” Jack whispers. Despite what little control Jack has over his father and his uncle, he’d feel infinitely better if he knew where they were. David’s life hangs in the balance and Jack can’t save him if he can’t predict when and from where the attack will come.

“It doesn’t matter,” David interjects. “Wherever the king is, we can’t expect him to save these people. We have to save them.”

Jack barely hears anything David says after _It doesn’t matter,_ because it does fucking matter. Finding Silas, William and Andrew before they find David matters more than anything.

* * *

The woods open onto a grassy slope and a cobble beach that leads to the water. Broad and lazy, the Prosperity River is almost a mile wide, much farther than most people can swim, especially in a current.

Jack is expecting the sight of the river, picturesque and glistening in the early morning light, but he isn’t expecting to see a few hundred people, huddled together next to the water.

Jack, Ezra, David, and his family head down the slope toward the group. The air is steeped with an undercurrent of desperate fear as people gaze across the river at their friends and families.

“How?” David gasps and somehow that one word is laced with enough emotion that they all understand what he is asking.

“Your men stole a boat,” Abe explains, clapping Ezra on the shoulder. “It only holds 30 people, but that’s how he got us out. Your other men keep making trips, saving people one boatload at a time.”

David’s mouth is hanging open slightly and his eyes are filled with pain as he slowly makes his way into the masses.

The shifting of the crowd starts with one man. Jack sees the exact moment it begins. The man’s eyes tilt up and take hold of David. He breathes in and tugs on the sleeve of the woman beside him, too young to be his wife. His daughter. And he whispers.

Initially, the word passes slowly enough that Jack can hear it every time it’s spoken.

Then the masses are rising and shifting, the name spreading so quickly that it becomes a constant hum with no meaning to Jack’s ears. People who are sitting on the cobble beach looking lost and overwhelmed, stand up. Mothers hoist their children into the air for a better look. Despite the presence of Jack, Ezra and the other Shepherds, the crowd only sees David.

Jack recalls when he crossed the Prosperity River two years ago after escaping his first palatial prison. He’d had no plan and nowhere else to go.

For weeks, he’d wandered through the towns of the disputed territory searching for David, hearing the people whisper about him in bars.

Even then, the people of that region had belonged to David. Forsaken by King Silas as their homeland had been given to Gath, they took solace in the hope of a future king who would look after them.

Jack can see how they waited for David to return, how they never forgot that he was their king, because they are gazing at him like he is a messiah who has finally come home.

A middle-aged woman with a flash of brilliant red hair steps toward David and wraps him in a hug.

Jessie leans toward Jack and explains, “She’s our neighbor.”

“Marie,” David murmurs into her ear. “Where’s Bob?”

“He’s still on the other side of the river. He forced me onto the boat. I shouldn’t have left him.”

“Don’t do that to yourself,” David says, turning back to Ezra. “Lieutenant, you transported all of these people with that one boat?”

“Yes, sir.”

“How long did it take?”

“A couple hours. It will take days to get everyone across, but that’s not even the problem because the boat will run out of fuel long before that.”

David runs a hand through his hair, his gaze shifting through the people who surround him until they finally land on Jack. “Then we’re going to need more boats.”

* * *

David begins organizing the refugees, sending people into the farmlands to acquire transportation, food and water. They scatter into the fields and back roads searching for farmhouses and the kindness of strangers.

Like the frayed ends of a rope, Jack watches as each group leaves, feeling the situation unravel. Hundreds of people now know that David is alive and Jack has no control over them. He could never hope to keep all of them quiet, even if he tried.

Jack is humming with so much dread, he feels like he’s vibrating. Every snapping twig in the forest causes him to jerk for his gun. He can’t tell if he’s crazy or if everyone else is, because nobody else seems the least bit worried about Silas or William, especially David, who is kneeling on the grass with Ezra and Abe trying to figure out how to save his people.

When David finally calls an end to the meeting, Jack grabs his forearm gently and pulls him aside.

“What’s up?” David asks, sounding oddly content, probably from the comfort of having a tangible task to achieve. He still seems completely unaware, or possibly ambivalent, about his own safety.

“I can’t control this situation,” Jack says.

“What do you mean?”

“You’ve sent dozens of people out for supplies. Any number of them could tell someone about the miraculous appearance of their messiah.”

“Messiah?”

“You,” Jack replies forcefully. When David starts to shake his head, probably preparing a humble speech about how he’s just like everybody else, Jack steps toward him, purposefully invading his personal space. He can’t take humility from the future king right now, not when there are much more important things to discuss like keeping him alive.

Before David can speak, Jack wraps a hand around his fingers, pulling David’s hand up and cradling it against his chest. In mere seconds, Jack’s nervous energy starts to dissipate. Sometimes this is all he needs to feel grounded, David’s warm skin next to his. Equally distracted, David leans into the touch, letting both of their hands rest against Jack’s chest.

“What’s wrong?” David asks, his voice low and calm. His eyes are so focused on Jack that it feels like they are the only two people in the world, despite the crowd on the beach below.

“The old king was right that there is freedom in being dead.” Jack can’t bring himself to utter Vesper’s name. “But I think it’s safe to say that that freedom is gone. Silas and William probably already know that you’re alive and if they don’t, they will.”

From the look on David’s face and the tightening of his fingers around Jack’s hand, these words are a revelation. “Shit. I was too wrapped up in what I was doing. I wasn’t even thinking. Damn it.”

Jack looks up at the heavens and actually smiles because he can’t believe that David understands. He’d been expecting some bullshit about Jack being too worried about him or that God would see to his safety. “Thank the Lord. I was beginning to think that you completely lacked self-preservation, that you were sacrificial to the core.”

David tightens his fingers around Jack’s hand and caresses the knuckles of his other hand across Jack’s cheek. It sends a wave of tranquility through his body. He’s vaguely aware of the fact that they are standing near a crowd of people, touching each other in a way reserved only for lovers. The part of his brain that spent years in the closet is screaming at him to push David away and take a step back, but he can’t.

David’s touch can light him up and make him hungry with desire or, like now, it can sooth every muscle in his body. His touch is everything and Jack refuses to step away from it willingly, no matter who might see.

“Contrary to popular belief,” David murmurs with a tiny smile, “I don’t appreciate it when people try to kill me. I’m just getting used to it, that’s all.”

Something about David’s tone makes Jack chuckle.

“I guess it’s fine to ‘get used to it’ as long as God is watching your back,” Jack replies with an edge of sarcasm, “but in case He blinks, I’d like to do what I can to help Him.”

“Okay,” David replies, sliding his hand from Jack’s neck to his arm. “What do you need from me, Jack?”

“Nothing, I just …” He trails off and looks around the cobble beach at the crowd. It is momentarily distracting how many people are looking at them, especially since Jack can’t read their expressions. He can’t tell if they are disgusted to learn that their messiah loves the former prince or simply surprised. But it’s Jessie’s eyes that stop Jack and hold his gaze. She’s smiling with a look that is absolute understanding. “David, does your mom know that you’re bi?”

David inhales in confusion at the non sequitur, “Uh, yeah. My whole family knows I’m bi. Why?”

Well, that’s confusing as hell. Jack turns back to David with furrowed brows. He can still recall his conversation with Jessie when they were in Gath years ago. She’d told Jack that she knew he was gay and that David could never love him like he wanted. She’d asked Jack to love David anyway, because her son needed it.

At the time Jack had taken those words to mean that David was straight, that their relationship could only ever be platonic. But maybe she’d already seen that they were meant for each other. Maybe she’d been trying to tell Jack how to love a future king. Because no matter how much David loves him, he belongs to these people. Jack will always have to share him. Even if he puts David before everything else, he can never expect that in return. A king must always put his people’s welfare first.

That’s the love that David needs from Jack and maybe Jessie had already known that years ago. David needs one person who will look after him while he takes care of a nation. He needs the sanctuary of Jack’s arms at night, a place where he can forget that he’s the king for just a moment.

But Jack can never forget. That is what it means to love a king.

“Jack?” David asks after he waits too long to reply, lost in thought. Jack brings David’s fingers to his lips, kissing each of them lightly. He’s probably overthinking Jessie’s comments from years ago, but he likes the idea that she saw their love and what they meant to each other long before they did.

“Sorry, I was just thinking,” Jack replies. “I need Ezra and that Chevy. Nobody’s phone can access the internet here, so I need to get out of this dead zone and check the news reports. I need to find any information I can on Silas and William. Where they are. If we’re in danger.”

David rubs his thumb along the top of Jack’s hand, their fingers still laced together. “That’s probably a good idea. Do you want to take anyone else or just Ezra?”

“You don’t mind if I go, honestly?”

“No. I’ve got plenty of people here to help me. Go.”

They’d spent so many years at odds with each other. This is so much easier, being a team, being honest. Jack leans in and whispers so no one else will hear, “I love you.”

“I know.” David smiles.

“Oh, you know, do you? So, do you want me to stop saying it?”

“Never,” David replies as his eyelids slide closed. Before Jack can stop him, he leans forward and softly brushes Jack’s lips with his own, letting them linger for less than a second before pulling away.

It is a chaste kiss, but it makes Jack’s stomach churn with desire because it is their first public kiss. It is the first real indication that David wants Jack by his side when he is king. For so many years Jack had struggled to achieve that title for himself, _king,_ he’s sure that nobody will ever believe that he prefers _prince consort,_ but it sounds as lovely as music. It’s a title of love, not of blood. But more importantly, it’s a title that Jack can only obtain when David is king, finally safe from Silas and William.

A pick-up truck rolls into the meadow, disrupting their private moment, and Jack steps away from David, letting go of his hand. Sean Shepherd jumps out of the passenger door of the truck, looking excited.

“This is the guy who owns that farmhouse beyond the trees,” Sean says to David, pointing to the driver of the vehicle, “and guess what he just told me. There’s a small dock five miles down the river. A dozen private fishing boats.”

David smiles at his brother, barely able to contain his excitement. “Great. Let’s go.” He turns to Jack. “Be careful.”

“You too.”

David squeezes Jack’s hand one last time before hopping into the back of the truck with his brothers and friends. He nods his head toward Jack in farewell.

As the truck starts moving, Jack hears Sean ask David, “So, is that your new boyfriend?”

Jack’s body grows rigid with anger and he considers jumping into the truck to punch Sean in the face.

“Yes,” David replies simply and without any embarrassment.

“Wait? For real? God damn it. Now I owe Abe money.” Sean smiles and bumps his shoulder playfully into David’s.

“Why?” David asks, his face scrunching in confusion as the truck begins to pull into the forest

“Because Sean and I made a bet when we were all living in Gath,” Abe explains, “and I just won.”

“You had a bet that Jack and I would …?" David's voice grows faint and unreadable as the truck pulls around the bend and out of sight.

David’s family is a fucking nightmare and Jack has never been more jealous.

* * *

The nearest town is a twenty-minute drive away and consists of a gas station, a pathetic general store and a smattering of houses. Population: 58. Thankfully, those 58 people must be require a cell tower because Ezra finally gains access to the internet on his phone.

He scrolls through the Gilboan News as Jack waits impatiently.

“William and Andrew have apparently fled the country,” Ezra says.

“Really? That doesn’t seem right.”

“Yeah.” Ezra purses his lips as he reads. “It might be bullshit. It’s from your father’s news network and there’s some propaganda about how powerful Silas is and that William is afraid of him. But there isn’t anything else about your uncle or your cousin. No sightings.”

“That’s not overly helpful,” Jack leans his head against his seat, staring out the front windshield, “What about the king? Is he in some undisclosed secure location, hiding from my uncle like a coward."

“Well …” Ezra keeps scrolling. “No. He is at Abiel Military Base apparently awaiting the arrival of the Austerian Air Force in a few hours. Wanna see the pictures?”

Jack takes the phone. It’s true. The king isn’t hiding at all. In fact, there are dozens of pictures of him and his top generals organizing a joint defensive with Austeria.

_Abiel Military Base._ Jack had been stationed there during the Gilboan-Gath War, so he knows its layout and the surrounding terrain well. And it’s only a thirty-minute drive away.

Silas is less than an hour from David. How long until he sends his troops to the river to haul David away in chains? William, the admittedly greater threat, slips into the back of Jack’s mind as the more immediate threat of Silas takes hold.

He eyes the M24 sniper rifle sitting next to Ezra. His mind goes to a dark place before he can stop it, an image of Silas’ head through the scope of that rifle right before Jack pulls the trigger.

“Fuck,” Jack hisses, turning back to the steering wheel and punching it. The pain is cathartic. He punches again harder. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!”

He’s lost in a loop of angry despair, punctuating each curse with a punch as Ezra looks on without judgment. Ten, twelve, fifteen punches later, he leans back and closes his eyes. He doesn’t know what to do, even though he knows what he _should_ do.

They are completely fucked. David is completely fucked.

“Sir,” Ezra says quietly. Jack doesn’t respond. “You know the king hasn’t tried to kill David in years. I don’t know if that’s what he wants anymore.”

Jack just shakes his head and whispers, “Fuck.” It seems to be the only word that exists to him.

“I mean, he could have killed him when we were in Austeria or he could have done it when you all flew back to Gilboa.”

“I know,” Jack says, still unwilling to open his eyes and face the reality of the situation. “But even if he won’t kill David, he will throw him in prison for decades and let him rot.”

“Yeah. That’s true,” Ezra murmurs unhelpfully. Jack had wanted him to argue, make some point that Jack hadn’t realized. But how can Ezra argue against reality?

“David will never be safe in Gilboa as long as Silas is alive.” Jack says the words before he can truly think about their consequences.

David will never be safe while Silas lives.

There is a sniper rifle sitting next to Jack.

Silas is 20 miles away.

Alone these three facts would be nothing, but together they form a clear purpose. It is obvious what Jack has to do. He may never get this chance again and if he doesn’t take it David will be captured and possibly killed.

“Major Benjamin,” Ezra says, gazing into his hands as he worries them together. “Your Majesty.”

Jack finally looks at him. Ezra has never, in their entire acquaintance, called Jack by a royal title, presumably because David was always his chosen king.

“Yes, lieutenant.”

“No matter what you decide, I’m with you in that decision. I’ll watch your back no matter what.”

Neither of them seems willing to put words to their plan even as it formulates in the air between and becomes _the plan._

“If we fail, Ezra, you’ll be hanged for treason. Even I might be hanged for treason this time.”

“I know.”

“Tell me the alternative,” Jack says, staring at the steering wheel, feeling lost in the hopelessly of his choices.

“We flee Gilboa.”

“Anything besides that one.”

Ezra hesitates and in the silence the entire world seems to stop. The trees in the forest stand still in the windless morning. No birds fly overhead. No chipmunks run through the underbrush. The world is dead. If Jack were David this would be a sign from God, verifying that he is right and justified in this decision. He’d feel a sense of clarity and purpose welling from inside and simply know.

Instead he feels only weariness. This murder will hang on him like a black mark forever, no matter how necessary and justified it might be. But there is no other choice and he meant his promise to David last night. He would do anything to protect him.

He takes a deep breath and puts the truck into gear, his voice low with fatigue and acceptance. “Then we’re headed to Abiel … to kill the king.”

* * *

They travel is silence, the weight of death hanging on their shoulders. How many times had Jack fantasized about killing his father? Too many to count, but now that it is a reality, he feels nauseated.

When they finally reach the edge of Abiel Military Base, Jack pulls onto a dirt road and parks beside a prominent hill just east of the complex. He grabs the rifle and scales the hill with Ezra, slowly and quietly.

From the summit, the base comes into view. They are over 500 meters from the central buildings, approaching the maximum range for his M24 sniper rifle. But the day is windless, so Jack can make the shot.

His stomach is still churning with dread, but he ignores it. Sitting on the grass beside Ezra, he finds peace in the act of checking his rifle. It gives his fingers something to do so they won’t start shaking.

Some of Jack’s happiest memories took place at this base when he was stationed here. Free from his father and his oppressive rules, Jack had finally felt useful and good at something.

And this was where he’d met Eli, his first love.

They used to come to this hill to make out, hidden by the trees but with a clear view of the base so they wouldn’t get caught. In fact, this was the first place he ever blew Eli, so maybe there is some twisted irony to the fact that he will kill his father from this spot.

They wait for over an hour as Jack tracks the movements of soldiers, officers and royal guards, looking for his father’s dark hair and the accompanying arrogant swagger. In the waiting, his nerves begin to calm and his hunger grows, making his stomach gurgle.

Ezra hands him a power bar before he even asks, the perfect junior officer, always ready.

“You know I missed you, Ez, when I was in France.”

“Yeah?” Ezra says with a faint grin. “I missed you too. Remember when you, David and I would go clubbing in Austeria, before you found Michelle.”

“Of course.” Jack can’t help smiling at the memory. It was a better time. He hadn’t been with David yet, still laboring under the assumption that he was straight. But he’d had David in a way that he didn’t have him now, all to himself.

“That’s why I thought you two were together back then,” Ezra says. “Neither of you ever brought a lady home and there were lots of fine ladies to choose from.”

Jack looks back at the base without really seeing it, his mind on the memories.

“We weren’t together but I think we kind of were, if you know what I mean.” It sounds stupid, but it is the closest approximation of the truth that he can find.

“I do,” Ezra replies.

The image of David during those months comes to Jack, carefree and raising a glass of bourbon with a warm smile, his eyes crinkling with laughter. Just the thought of it makes Jack’s body warm with desire, and something else that has nothing to do with sex.

He is so consumed by the memories that he almost misses the distinctive strut and the crisp dark suit as his father walks across the base’s courtyard.

“Shit.” He throws the half-eaten power bar on the ground and looks through the rifle’s scope, swinging it around, trying to find his mark.

Beside him Ezra stops breathing and watches with widened eyes.

The crosshairs find Silas and Jack takes a deep breath, letting it out as his body relaxes for the shot.

Always fire on the exhale.

He tracks the king across the courtyard through his scope. Silas is conversing with a general and looking slightly annoyed. It makes Jack wonder what they are talking about. David? The Philistines? William?

Jack waits so long that he has to take another breath. He exhales slowly, his finger twitching on the trigger, slippery with sweat. The spring morning air suddenly feels as hot as a furnace.

Silas keeps walking, almost to the building on the opposite side of base. He is almost behind cover again. Jack can’t keep hesitating. One more breath, that is all he has time for. He has to shoot on this exhale or the opportunity will be lost, possibly forever.

It’s easy, just the squeezing of his index finger and the world is free of a tyrant. David is one step closer to being safe.

It’s easy. Except his hand starts shaking slightly.

This is his only chance. He can’t blow this shot. His mind is screaming _Take the shot,_ but his body keeps rebelling against his mind until the general who is walking with Silas opens the door to the building, and the king walks inside.

“Fuck,” Jack whispers, dropping his forehead onto the soft grass beside his rifle.

Ezra is so quiet he might not be breathing, as Jack quietly falls apart with his forehead resting on the grass. He’s failed. If Silas kills David someday, Jack will only have himself to blame because he couldn’t shoot Silas when he had the chance. He wasn’t strong enough.

Seconds, maybe minutes, pass before he has the strength to stand, looking at Ezra in defeat.

“We can get you and David out of the country,” Ezra says, keeping his voice calm and even. “We can’t go back to Austeria, but we’ll find something.”

“Tamara’s in Shiloh.” Jack’s voice doesn’t sound like his own, too broken and dead. “David can’t miss any more of her life.”

Ezra nods quietly.

“And the Philistines are attacking,” Jack continues. “Gilboa is on the edge of destruction. Do you want to leave her right now? Run away while she burns?”

“No.”

“Neither do I,” Jack says, turning to stare at the low grey buildings below, “and I can guarantee David doesn’t either.”

“Then what do you want to do, sir?”

Such a simple question, but impossible to answer. He’s stuck between Scylla and Charybdis with only two undesirable options. Stay and see David eventually die at the hands of Silas or William. Leave and watch from afar as Gilboa goes to war.

He needs a third option.

If only Michelle were here. She’s the wisest in their family. She’d have an idea and if she didn’t, she’d say something insightful and it would give Jack an idea, like on their final night in Austeria when they’d imbibed too much wine and laughed over childhood stories. She’d been trying to tell Jack something that night without actually saying the words. Remind him of something he already knew.

The Benjamins used to be a family.

They used to love each other.

“Ezra,” Jack says, still looking at the base, “go back to the river and help save the refugees.”

“Why? Sir, what are you planning?”

Jack picks up the M24 rifle, slinging it across his back.

“Jack,” Ezra looks slightly horrified. “You were probably right not to kill him. Please—“

“I’m not going to kill him,” Jack interrupts, “but David and I are not leaving Gilboa. We’re not hiding just to appease my father’s insecurities. I’m finished letting him make the decisions.”

He turns and starts down the hill, yelling over his shoulder, “I’m going to talk to that asshole until he agrees to a truce.”

“Then you still need someone watching your back,” Ezra shouts as he chases after him.

Jack can’t deny the truth of that. This might be the most idiotic decision he’s ever made.


	20. I've got better things to do than survive

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Title from "Swan Dive" by Ani DiFranco.

Jack is expecting to be cuffed and led to a tiny cell. He isn’t expecting to be taken into the bowels of the command center at Abiel Base, a section he was never allowed to enter when he was stationed here. He isn’t expecting the dark conference room with a massive oak table or the wall of monitors covered with satellite images.

He pauses in the doorway and the guard gently tries to push him inside. The king looks haggard as he sits at the table with his top three generals.

“Jack, please sit down,” Silas says.

Jack’s legs feel like lead. The entire walk down the hill, he’d been rehearsing arguments in his head, trying to figure out how to win so that David could stay in Gilboa. Should he plead for the future of their nation? Should he mention God? Should he offer some type of trade and if so what? Did he have anything his father wanted?

All of these previous plans scatter into the air as Jack stands in the doorway. He has no idea how to interpret his father’s behavior, welcoming Jack into the inner sanctum as if he’s a trusted son and companion.

“My lieutenant?” Jack asks without moving. They took Ezra away immediately, but they never handcuffed either of them.

“He’s in the mess hall,” Silas replies, sounding annoyed about wasting time on something so mundane. “He doesn’t have security clearance for this room.”

“Neither do I,” Jack observes.

“I’m making an exception.” Silas waves his hand toward the empty chair and Jack decides to sit, merely for the sake of curiosity.

The guard beside him is still carrying Jack’s M24 sniper rifle. There is no way that Silas is unaware of Jack’s original intentions. The king has to know that Jack sat on the eastern hill and pointed a gun at him. Yet Silas doesn’t seem the least bit concerned or angry or annoyed or any of the normal emotions the king tends toward when people don’t do exactly what he wants.

“Ellis, please pull up the 1183-A satellite images with the timestamps,” Silas says.

The first false color image is of the distinctive mouth of the river and David’s hometown, Port Prosperity. The timestamp is from two days ago.

“Proceed through images, one second delay.”

On the large display screen the satellite image of Port Prosperity clicks to the next image taken 90 minutes after the original, and then another 90 minutes later. At first the images all look the same but then Jack notices a mass of squares and dots moving from the north.

“Those larger objects,” Jack says leaning forward and squinting his eyes, “are they tanks?”

“Yes,” Silas replies. “They’re tanks.”

But they can’t be. There are dozens of them moving toward Gilboa. The other dots must be troops and vehicles. It looks like a plague of locusts advancing across the countryside around Port Prosperity, destroying everything in its path. And it’s coming for Gilboa.

“This is over a hundred miles west of us,” Jack says. “What about north of us? New Hope? Calvary? Are tanks crossing the border there too?”

“Unfortunately, satellite coverage of the eastern sections of our border are poor, but we have reports of troop movements and invasion. I don’t know the extent.”

“How long?” Jack asks when they reach the final image, timestamp: 24 minutes ago.

“Hours. Minutes.”

“We’re about to be invaded? Why isn’t this in the news?”

“I was gathering information for the press release which I’m about to give. I don’t want widespread panic due to misinformation.”

“But if it’s happening in a matter of hours, the people deserve to know now.”

Jack waits for a reaction from the king. He receives nothing. His father has completely lost his mind, staring with vacant eyes at the satellite images. He’s always filtered the Gilboan news outlets but he’s never kept something as important as a hostile invasion from his citizens.

“Ellis,” the king’s voice is quiet and hollow, “please pull up the two satellite images we have for 11278. These are from central Ekron, six hours ago and then 30 minutes ago, respectively.”

The first image shows dozens of large planes, probably bombers, parked at a base early this morning. The second picture is of the exact same location, but there are no planes.

“Are they headed here?” Jack’s voice is breathy and he’s starting to feel lightheaded. He needs to tackle this situation slowly and think through the possible solutions. It’s too much to take in all at once.

“Probably.” The king still seems dead on the inside, so accepting of the impending attack. He’s given up. How can _this_ king, this hollowed-out broken king, protect his nation against an invasion the likes of which Jack has never seen?

“Father?” Jack asks after too many seconds of silence. The king sits up straighter in his chair, coming back to life and turning to his generals.

“Will you please give me and my son five minutes?”

Without a word they gather their papers and laptops and shuffle out of the room. Two guards remain by the door.

“Alone,” the king growls at them, sounding more like himself. Angry is better than broken because it means that Silas still cares about something.

When they are alone, Silas punches a button on the console and the satellite images stop rotating. They halt on the photo of the planes all lined up at the base in Ekron. It is the most ominous picture in the collection. Those planes are in the air right now, somewhere, carrying countless bombs. Hundreds, perhaps thousands of people are going to die today. Jack turns away from the screen and looks at his father.

They are seated across from each other, six feet of oak separating them as the king rubs the bridge of his nose and sighs.

“The Austerian Air Force arrives tonight to help,” Silas says, staring blankly at the screen, “but we’ll be attacked today.”

“You have to tell the people _now_ ,” Jack replies, leaning over the table.

“I know. I will,” Silas says, but he doesn’t move. He’s never been a man to crumble under the pressure. He’s always faced every situation head-on like a goddamned juggernaut. It was a decidedly annoying trait but somehow infinitely better than this quiet defeat.

“What the hell is wrong with you right now?” Jack says, his voice so loud with frustration that it echoes through the empty conference room. Thankfully, it breaks whatever spell his father is under and he turns to Jack. He seems to study his son as he chews on the inside of his cheek, considering his words.

“God used to help me,” Silas says calmly. It’s such an honest statement and not at all what Jack is expecting.

He’s always loved his father but he also violently dislikes him. And there has always been a wall of pretense in their relationship. Ever since Jack was a teenager, the atmosphere between them has been charged with unspoken half-truths, even before Silas outed Jack on the steps of the palace.

Neither of them has ever been capable of scaling this invisible barrier, but with those few simple words the king is taking a sledgehammer to it. He is trying to break down the wall between them and Jack has no idea why.

“God hasn’t given up on Gilboa,” Jack replies, hoping that he isn’t rebuilding the wall with his words because he’s curious to see the truth that lives in his father’s soul. A truth he’s never been privy to. “It seems a bit absurd to me, injured birds and butterflies and thunderstorms, but God is still there. The person he is talking to now, you could just ask that person what God is saying.”

Silas laughs so deep in his throat it sounds like a growl.

“I should ask David Shepherd to play telephone for me and God? That’s brilliant, Jack.”

“It was just a suggestion. You don’t have to be a dick,” Jack mutters under his breath, knowing that Silas does have to be a dick. It is his favorite pastime. “Or you could abdicate the throne.”

“I didn’t bring you here to discuss Shepherd or how we should become friends, because we won’t.” Silas finally sounds like himself, angry with a side of exasperated.

“Then why did you bring me here and show me all of these images?” Jack asks.

He’s genuinely curious but that isn’t why he stops being sarcastic. For the first time in his life he thinks that he might get a straight answer from his father. He doesn’t want to fuck this up by falling back into their standard roles. Silas yelling and trying to bend Jack to his will. Jack fighting against him even as he unconsciously twists to fit into his father’s mold.

They are standing on the brink of something massive: truth. Jack can’t mess this up with petulance.

“Your uncle and cousin have fled to Ekron.”

“They’ve joined the enemy?” It shouldn’t come as a surprise but it does. William is a money-grubbing asshole but joining the Philistines as they position to destroy Gilboa seems too low even for him.

“Yes, along with their billions of dollars,” Silas responds, resting his elbow on the table and rubbing the dark scruff on his chin. “They’ve joined the enemy. I brought you here to ask if you have too.”

“Joined the enemy?” Jack inquires, confused by his father’s wording.

“Yes.”

“That depends on who you think the enemy is.” It sounds vague, but Silas knows exactly what Jack means.

“Shepherd is a problem. Ekron is the enemy.”

“Then you know my answer.”

“I need you to prove it.” Silas spreads his palms onto the oak table, rubbing them slowly and staring into his son’s eyes. “I need you to steal away into Ekron and cut your uncle and cousin down once and for all.”

“What?” This entire conversation is a maze that Jack can’t figure out, because his father is no longer someone he remotely understands. The past few years have hollowed his father out and left a shell of deluded paranoia. He isn’t the same man.

“I know what William and Andrew did to the prison last night. I know that you thirst for their deaths, perhaps more than I do.” Jack leans back and contemplates his father’s words. Does he thirst for their blood in a final act of vengeance? If they are no longer a direct threat to David, does he actually want to kill them?

Silas continues, “That’s why you came here to shoot me, because you needed an outlet for your anger. It’s something I understand all too well, but your anger is for William and Andrew. I’m asking you to use it and kill them.”

“But you have literally dozens of covert operatives who you could send into Ekron. Why me?”

The corner of the king’s mouth tilts up and his eyes lose focus as he stares at the wall behind Jack.

“Because you’re my blood and I want my blood to be the last thing that William sees in this world. If I could cut him down myself, I would. I was too forgiving, throwing him in prison. I did it for your mother, but I should have slit his throat instead. Just as I should have gutted Vesper with my blade thirty years ago. And yet I chose mercy for both of them.”

At the mention of Vesper’s name the hairs on Jack’s arm stand on end. He takes a shaky breath. “If you are out to kill everyone who has tried to overthrow you, you have to kill me too.”

Silas merely raises an eyebrow and Jack feels like a trapped animal under his glare.

“Is that your plan?” Jack asks. “Convince me kill William and Andrew and while I’m distracted you murder David, and then upon my return you kill me? Just like that, every usurper is dead?

Silas actually chuckles, deep and low. It only increases Jack’s anxiety.

“That is _not_ my plan, but I like it. It’s a good plan, Jack. You’ve always been…admirably ruthless.”

“I wasn’t saying I would do that,” Jack replies quickly. He has been ruthless especially lately, but hearing Silas describe him as such knocks him back into reality. Had he come that close to being just like his father?

“Except you already killed Vesper, didn’t you?”

Jack sucks in a breath as his equilibrium shifts. He feels so unbalanced that he actually sways in his chair.

“They found his body in the woods outside the prison,” Silas says quietly. “Shot in the back and in the head. It was you, wasn’t it? I can’t imagine Shepherd had the strength to do it.”

Jack doesn’t respond, which is answer enough.

“Killing William and Andrew will be ten times more justified.”

“No,” Jack whispers, studying the swirling rings of light and dark in the oak table underneath his fingers because he can’t look at his father right now.

He traces the never-ending loops in the wood where they flow around a blackened knot, anastomosing as they widen and narrow together in a pointless design. Just like all of the pointless decisions in his life.

How many times has Jack ever actually made a decision that belonged completely to him? Has he always just been reacting to his father, his mother, William, even David? Always pushed and molded by everyone else like the wood grain around the knot that can’t control its own shape.

If David is right and God is really up there, pulling strings and sending messages, then what does He want from Jack? What does He _ever_ want from His sheep, the ones who aren’t worthy enough to be spoken to?

“No?” Silas asks, clearly annoyed both by Jack’s answer and the fact that his son appears to find the table more fascinating than the king’s request.

It must be horribly disorienting for his father. To be guided by God for so long only to have the tether snap and to be cast out, adrift and flailing. Directionless just like everybody else.

In the decades that Jack has known his father he has felt every emotion for him that exists, except one: pity. This thought is a revelation because pity is all that he can find in his heart right now as he tilts his head up to look at his father. The king’s eyes are dark from lack of sleep and the worry lines in his face look as deep as trenches.

God has abandoned Silas and now he’s lost.

“No. I don’t want to be an assassin for the king,” Jack says, knowing that Silas will think he means the present king, but he actually means David.

He hadn’t truly understood David’s horror over Vesper’s death until this moment. Jack would not only kill for David, he would die for him. That will _never_ change, but it doesn’t mean that David wants him to, and it doesn’t mean that he should.

“Then what do you want? To run away to France again and go clubbing every night with your boys?” Silas asks with obvious disappointment.

“No. I want to stay and fight for Gilboa. I’m an officer, a soldier. It’s the only thing I’ve ever been good at.” Jack pauses at the words because they aren’t wholly accurate. The deaths of his twelve men come rushing back into his thoughts, too heavy to bear. “Except for the night I wasn’t good at it. But I want to try to be again.”

Silas closes his eyes and his face goes slack. Jack waits for the verbal punch. _You’ve never had honor. You were never a good soldier._

“The night you were captured by Gath,” Silas says quietly, his body growing taut as if the words are being dragged out of him against his will, “I pulled your air support. I didn’t know it was your platoon.”

If the world had felt like it was tilting out of control before, it stops completely in this moment. There is only terra firma under Jack’s feet. No more doubt or confusion. So much of his life has been built on lies, but it stops here and now.

When Silas looks up there is a thread of guilt behind his eyes. Whether it is because he pulled Jack’s air support or because he lied about it afterwards, Jack will never know because he doesn’t care to ask. It doesn’t matter. He still failed his men and they are still dead. There is no point in crying about it afterward. There is only the next battle and the next purpose.

“I won’t hunt down William and Andrew as we’re being invaded.” Jack’s voice is so confident that he knows his father won’t dare question his resolve even if he doesn’t like Jack’s words. “I want to stay and fight.”

For a second, the king looks surprised, possibly even impressed, before he pulls a handgun from the briefcase at his feet. He slides the gun across the table toward his son.

“David can’t stay,” Silas says, “but you can.”

“Why? He’s less likely to shoot you than I am.”

“I know.” Silas rubs his eyes as his fatigue sets in. “You forget that I know the boy. You forget that I actually liked him before you did.”

“Yeah. What is that about?” Jack smiles faintly before he can stop himself. “Is there only enough affection here for one of us to like David at any given moment? As my affection grew, yours had to wilt?”

“As God’s affection grew,” Silas corrects him, rubbing the stubble on his chin. Ah yes, it was God’s betrayal that hurt Silas the most, not Jack’s.

“You can’t kick David out of Gilboa,” he states. “Tamara’s here. Don’t rip them apart.”

“This is non-negotiable, Jack, and I don’t have time for a conversation that is pointless. You have the gun, now it’s up to you what you do with it. But I meant what I said. You can stay. He can’t.”

“But why?” It is the last time Jack will try. He came to convince Silas to let David stay, but that was before he knew about Ekron’s forces advancing toward them. That was before there were bigger problems than whether David would get to raise Tamara. Now Jack just hopes that Tamara will be alive come the morrow.

“For the same reason you killed Vesper or have you already forgotten why you did it?” Silas rises to his feet, signaling that the conversation is at an end. “Because two kings can’t share the same space and I’m not dead yet.”

Jack doesn't miss the hidden meaning in Silas' words. He has finally admitted that David is a king, the future king, and that Jack isn’t.

Silas grabs his briefcase and heads toward the door while Jack stares at the handgun on the table and tries to make a decision, perhaps the only decision that he has ever made in his life. Clean and clear and entirely his.

He knows what he _wants_ to do. He wants to find David and run away to some other part of the world and make love all day long. It might get boring after a few months, but right now it seems like heaven.

He knows what he _should_ do, return to Shiloh with Silas. Protect Gilboa, his sister and his niece. Use this opportunity to get back into his father’s good graces and try to convince him to let David back into the country.

“Jack,” Silas says right before he swings the door open to leave. “I do promise that after Shepherd leaves, I won’t try to kill him. I need to give a press statement. Then I’m leaving for Shiloh within the hour. You have until then to decide.”

Silas’ footsteps fade away and Jack is left staring at the gun, weighing his choices.

Is it a blessing or a curse for David to constantly have the voice of God guiding him? He surely never feels as conflicted as Jack does right now, but is it annoying to have to do God’s will or is it reassuring?

“What should I do?” Jack whispers to God, because He did speak to Jack once, when the butterflies led him to Michelle. In that moment, Jack had felt dread, knowing that the butterflies were leading him toward pain. But there had also been a comfort in _knowing_ that he was being led by God, that his actions had a higher purpose.

Now there is no answer. He still isn’t worthy of hearing God’s voice. But he can’t accept that. Why should God speak to Silas and David and never to him?

“God, I’m going to spin this gun and if the barrel points to the screens, I go to Shiloh. If it points to the door, I go to David.”

Jack stands and takes a deep breath. He can’t play this like it’s a simple coin flip, a suggestion that he can disregard. This is God; he has to do whatever God tells him to do. No questions and no hesitation.

He checks the safety and, fired up with adrenaline, he spins the gun so furiously that it slides right off of the oak table and onto the floor.

 _It still counts,_ Jack thinks. _Just because it is on the floor doesn’t mean it doesn’t count._

He jumps back and the gun lands, impossibly propped upright on the grip and the hammer with the barrel pointed straight up at the ceiling.

Holding his breath, Jack waits for it fall. It doesn’t.

“What the fuck? What the hell does that mean?” Jack yells, instantly regretting it. It’s probably not wise to yell at God. But then awareness courses through him, almost like a voice that isn’t his.

_I only tell people what to do when they actually need me to._

Jack laughs and runs his hand through his hair. Is God this snarky with David? He hopes so. David needs divine sarcasm in his life, but Jack does not.

With a sigh of acceptance, he picks the gun off the ground and walks out of the conference room.

God is right. Sassy, but right. He must have known that Jack wanted to make the decision on his own and that he’d merely had a moment of weakness. That moment is gone.

If he is going to do what he _should_ rather than what he _wants_ , he can’t pass the blame of that choice onto God or Silas or even David. Going back to Shiloh in the hopes that he can save Gilboa is entirely his decision, as it should be.


	21. Nor do the wind, the sun or the rain

The emperor of the Philistines has never been a patient man. Yet, for decades he waited, hiding, accumulating wealth and secretly amassing an army. For decades he held the memory of his father and mother being cut down by Austerian soldiers as he watched, only two weeks shy of his sixth birthday.

Finally his time has come, so he no longer needs patience. And money, he needs even less, which was why he initially decided to execute William Cross and his obnoxious son, Andrew, when they arrived last night. What better way to demonstrate his unrelenting power? But before he could lower his blade, the man’s son had said something interesting and unexpected. Something about how King Silas was at a military base in the north. Something about a weakness in Gilboa’s defense network and how a few Philistine soldiers could slip through unnoticed.

Andrew Cross’ information hadn’t changed the emperor’s plans, merely his timetable. The destruction of Gilboa and its king would occur today rather than in a few months. And so he had ordered his troops to turn south and his bombers to take to the air.

Born from the ashes of a bitter war, Gilboa’s strength had been built on the foundation of one man, Silas Benjamin. Take that man out and conquering Gilboa would be as simple as driving a tank into Shiloh, stepping out and raising the Philistine flag in triumph. The people would cower before their new emperor and then he could turn his attention to his true enemy, Austeria.

So the emperor had allowed William and Andrew Cross to live. For now. But the younger one is so tedious, the emperor will probably kill him before the month is out. Or he will kill him today if his information about King Silas is false. It is certainly possible that the Crosses are aligned with Silas and attempting to lead the emperor into a trap, but it doesn’t deter him. He doesn’t fear Gilboa’s puny military and the possible reward greatly outweighs the risk of losing a few men.

For this is just the beginning. Soon, the entire region will belong to the emperor, everything from the northern ocean to the salt sea and every one of his enemies will be rotting in the earth.

* * *

A light spring mist is hanging in the air when Jack makes his way across the courtyard to find Ezra. Silas is giving a press release on the invasion, which allows Jack a few precious moments to get his affairs in order.

He looks up at blue sky, dappled with a few low-hanging white clouds. It isn’t the type of weather that should be able to produce rain. There are no clouds directly over Jack’s head and yet his eyelashes and cheeks grow damp as he walks through the hanging water droplets.

“So you’re up there?” he whispers to God, barely moving his lips. “If I’m going to Shiloh, you have to watch over David for me. Don’t let me down on this one, big guy.”

It might be a bit cocky speaking to God in this manner, but after their “conversation” in the conference room, Jack feels a connection with Him, almost like they’re friends. And God obviously likes David and plans to protect him anyway, so Jack isn’t asking for the Sun and the Moon.

Ezra is in the mess hall, an armed guard eying him from a nearby table.

“Jack.” Ezra jumps to his feet and wraps an arm around him, oblivious to the guard’s glare. “Tell me you succeeded.”

“Uh, not exactly. We have bigger problems. Cell phone?”

“They took it. I don’t know where it is,” Ezra says with an apologetic frown.

Jack does not have time for this. “I’m realigned with my father,” he says to the guard, avoiding the look of perplexed horror on Ezra’s face. “As prince, I command you to find me a phone.”

“No disrespect but I’ll need to check on that.”

“Fine, but be quick. I’d like to make a call before the fall of Gilboa.”

Ezra clasps Jack’s shoulder and turns him roughly. “Fall of Gilboa?”

The guard calls his supervisor on his two-way radio as Jack explains, “Ekron tanks, troops and planes are on their way. They are invading today.”

Ezra’s mouth drops open. “But they just invaded Gath. What are they thinking?”

Jack is saved from providing an answer he doesn’t have by the low hum of an engine in the distance, growing louder. His confused scowl matches his two companions’ expressions perfectly.

“What is that?” the guard asks.

The answer hits Jack like a bullet. “Planes,” he replies.

Slowly, shuffling as if they are the walking dead, Jack, Ezra and the guard wander out of the mess hall and into the courtyard. They aren’t alone. Generals, lieutenants and infantrymen come out of every building and turn their faces to the sky. They would appear comical to anyone watching, all peering to the northwest, raising their hands over their eyes to shield against the light mist.

Six P-8 Poseidon bombers are flying only a couple miles away. Jack sucks in a breath and doesn’t exhale as he waits for them to turn left and head toward the base.

They don’t. They just keep flying.

“Do you think they are going to Bethel or Shiloh?” Ezra asks. Jack has no idea so he doesn’t reply.

Why would they bomb civilians rather than a military base? It makes no tactical sense, until the sound of the planes dies away and in the silence he hears another even fainter hum beginning to mount. To the north, the sky is filled with a sea of tiny silver dots. Dozens, maybe even hundreds, of planes are flying south from Gath and Ekron. They’ll be here in minutes.

A plague of locusts indeed.

* * *

There is no time. The king’s white hawk helicopter is already flying over the buildings toward the helipad in the center of the courtyard and Silas is striding from the command center.

Jack turns to Ezra. He has so many things to say, so many instructions for him and messages for David. He thought he’d have more time. He doesn’t know where to begin.

“You have to find David,” Jack says gripping Ezra’s shoulders, “and get him to safety. Head south, stay in Gilboa if can. Tell him that I’m still on his side. I just need to work on my father—“

“Jack!” Silas yells from across the courtyard as the helicopter approaches.

“Damn it,” Jack hisses. There isn’t enough time.

The guard who had been with Ezra in the mess hall pushes a small pad and a pencil into Jack’s hands.

Yes. A message. He can write a message.

_David,_

_Gilboa is being invaded. I’m headed back to Shiloh with Father, but I will always be on your side. I’ll look after Michelle and Tamara, just save yourself and your family. Get away from the border as soon as you can. Go to Ammon if you have to flee._

_Jack_

It sounds so unemotional and incomplete. He has no idea when he’ll see David again. He prays that it is only days, but it could be weeks or months. He can’t leave it like this, but love letters are not his forte even if he had time to draft one.

What do lovers write to each other when faced with separation? Do they simply steal the words of others who are more poetic? If only Jack had bothered to memorize a romantic poem … or read one, ever.

He pens an addition.

_P.S. You are my light. No matter how long it takes to be reunited, I’m yours. Forever._

It is horribly sentimental just like David, so he’ll probably like it.

Jack folds the piece of paper and hands it to Ezra. “Give this to David. If you look at it, I’ll kill you myself.”

Despite the situation, Ezra smiles, “Guess what, your love letters don’t interest me.”

With a sigh, the prince pulls Ezra into a quick hug, murmuring into his ear before stepping away, “Help God take care of him.”

“Always.”

The helicopter has just landed and Silas and two generals are running toward it.

“If at all possible, keep David in Gilboa.” Jack is speaking almost too quickly to be understood. He doesn’t have time to say everything he needs to say. “If you have to leave, go to Ammon. The youngest princess, Abigail, is a friend and she’ll help you.”

“Okay,” Ezra replies calmly, “He’ll be fine. I promise. Go.”

Jack simply has to trust in God, something he’s never completely done until this moment. But as long as David is in His favor, he will be safe. Gilboa may not be.

He repeats these words to himself as he jogs toward the helipad, trying to find strength in them. The rotor of the white hawk helicopter spins furiously, and Jack is under no illusions that his father will wait for him if he isn’t on board in ten seconds.

His footsteps only stutter once as he almost turns and chooses to return to David. Who cares about ridiculous wood grain metaphors, guns that stand on end and divine purposes? What is he thinking going back to Shiloh with his father? His body swings like a pendulum in mid-jog and he almost turns back.

No. By going back to Shiloh, he is choosing David. He’s choosing the hope of a future in which they can be together.

Sacrifice always comes before the reward.

* * *

Jack is still struggling to wrap the shoulder straps across his chest and snap them into the four-point harness, as the helicopter lifts off. Silas is sitting on Jack’s left, so close their shoulders are almost touching, with the two generals across from them.

When he was a child, Jack loved helicopters. They always gave him the feeling that he could truly fly, like he was a bird, hovering, rolling, and banking. There is something far more organic and exhilarating about the way helicopters fly compared to planes. But he lost his taste for them in the military after a few touch-and-go moments and he is _not_ enjoying this one at all, if only because of the view.

As they rise a hundred feet above the ground and tilt forward to accelerate over the buildings, Jack gets his first unimpeded look at the Philistine forces advancing from the north. The mist is clearing and in the plains of northern Gilboa, he can see all of the way to the Prosperity River. The northern sky is nothing but bombers, shining in the sunlight as they disappear and reappear in the scattered white clouds.

Silas is with him in despair when Jack turns to him. His father’s eyes are as hollow as a moonless night and as lost as Jack feels. This is worse than anything they have ever faced. The war with Gath is a mosquito bite compared to this.

The helicopter banks right and flies north toward the advancing enemy forces, but the bombers don’t concern Jack. They fly too high and lack maneuverability, so they don’t pose a threat to the helicopter.

Pulling on his helmet, he plugs in to the comms and presses the _Talk_ button. “Are we going to Gibeah?” It is an airfield two miles to the north, much bigger than the pathetic runway at Abiel, which is hardly long enough for a Cessna.

“My plane is there. That’s how we’ll fly home,” Silas replies, his voice sounding tinny and distant over the comms.

Going “home” shouldn’t bring Jack any joy, but it does. He misses Shiloh and this feels like the first step toward obtaining the future he desires, living in Shiloh with David. Never before has his father so willingly shown weakness to Jack like he did in that conference room. It gives Jack hope that, in time, he can persuade Silas to let David back into the country. It is so obviously the right decision. David would be an asset in the war against the Philistines, a symbol, a soldier and an earpiece for God. Silas will understand that one day; Jack will force him to understand.

The helicopter clears a copse of trees and rises to fly over the terminal of Gibeah, the crisscrossing runways coming in to view. That’s when Jack realizes that something is very wrong. There are plumes of smoke rising from the tarmac, so thin that they were invisible from a distance. Every plane at Gibeah has been destroyed, a dozen smoldering metal carcasses that turn Jack’s joy into a hard nugget of fear.

At the sight, the pilot pulls back on the control stick and the helicopter stops in mid-air, its nose pointed at the sky. Jack gazes out of the starboard window and sees the line of three armored Humvees, only a few hundred feet away, parked next to the ruined planes. They are painted with the dark blue and green colors of Ekron, and each of them has an M60 machinegun mounted on its roof, probably carrying armor-piercing rounds. Jack grips his fingers into his thighs, sure to leave bruises.

It’s an ambush.

Beside him, the king looks bewildered and suddenly very old. Lost. His defense network must have been compromised and now his helicopter is facing down the enemy. It’s as if the Philistines knew exactly where the king was…because they did. Of course, William and Andrew are to blame. The Crosses would have needed something more than mere money to ingratiate themselves to the Philistine emperor. In war, information is the only true currency.

“Go back to base,” Silas yells into the comms before facing forward and tightening the shoulder straps of his harness.

Bullets rip through the airframe above Jack’s head as the Ekron troops open fire. It was undoubtedly a stupid decision to take the king’s personal white hawk helicopter, orange butterflies conspicuously emblazoned on either side.

The pilot rolls to the left and loses altitude, racing toward the trees where he hopes to take cover. Jack can do nothing but grab his shoulder straps and hang on. During the war, he had been in a few helicopters that were under fire, so the rapid banking doesn’t bother him. It’s almost like a roller coaster but with the possibility of death.

The helicopter is hugging the top of the tree line, racing past the ground at 100 mph, swerving to avoid tree branches. It crests a small hill and dips down the other side.

They are safe.

Jack turns to his father and blows out a breath that makes his cheeks expand as if to say, _That was too close. Let’s not do that again._

 

An odd look comes over Silas’ face as he stares at Jack, joy mixed with familiarity and a little bit of longing. It turns Jack’s heart to ice because it looks almost like… _love._ How dare his father look at him like that, like Jack is the beloved prodigal son who has finally returned after losing his way. That is not why Jack made this decision.

He scowls and grits his teeth, looking straight ahead, past the two generals and out the front window of the helicopter. His entire body is shaking with anger.

This is not the reconstruction of their familial bond. This is not Silas’ chance to tear Jack down and rebuild him in his own image. This is Jack’s moment to make his father into the king that Gilboa needs. And if he can’t, he won’t hesitate to take Michelle and Tamara and disappear into the night to find David.

This is not his father’s happy fucking ending.

As the helicopter flies across a cornfield between two expanses of trees, Jack continues to stare straight ahead, refusing to look at anything. He doesn’t know why that one expression from his father has made him so angry, except that it looked so smug. Like Silas thinks that he has won.

Jack is staring at the back of the pilot’s head but he sees nothing, too lost in frustration. He doesn’t venture a glance out of the starboard window, so he doesn’t see the dark blue Humvee parked in the cornfield. He doesn’t see the man crouched beside the vehicle, a bazooka propped on his shoulder and pointed at the helicopter, or the plume of smoke that billows out of it as he fires.

Without warning, the missile slams into the helicopter’s tail, knocking Jack into his father and stealing his breath.

The entire world is shaking and lurching as the pilot fights for control, but it’s useless. The tail rotor has been blown off. They start to slip out of the sky.

“Shit,” Jack whispers pressing his body into his seat.

He has taken every imaginable training course on helicopter crashes. So, his body immediately assumes the crash position: arms crossed over his chest as he grips the shoulder straps, head down, feet planted flat on the floor to push him back into his seat.

The military is extremely thorough in their training but there is one thing they can’t duplicate about a helicopter crash: the spinning. The gut twisting, completely disorienting spinning of the passenger compartment as the tail rotor is compromised.

There is no gravity. No up or down. Just the endless disorientation and the stream of ridiculous thoughts that careen through Jack’s mind. Nothing so profound as his life flashing before his eyes. Nothing so comforting as David’s smiling face.

Just, _This is it. Oh fuck. This is it._

And then he thinks of Michelle. He might not remember the comfort of her heartbeat next to him in the darkness of the womb, but his body remembers and it grasps for that comfort as the beginning and the end meld into one.

His mind disconnects completely from his flesh and the helicopter dips left and continues to spin and fall. He doesn’t notice how his father throws his right arm across Jack’s chest, trying to push his son back into his seat. He doesn’t notice how all of the past betrayals and disappointments disappear in the moments before death, because a father protects his son instinctively.

He has no idea how long they’ve been falling and spinning, a second or a lifetime, because everything is happening at once and time has no meaning. The end is coming, coming, but when? No matter what, he can’t control his last moment because he can’t see the ground as it rises to meet them. He can’t see Death coming.

So his last thought before the crash is not of David or Michelle. It isn’t something joyful to carry him into the darkness. His last thought is an angry question at God. Why would He speak to Jack today, support his decision to go to Shiloh, only to let him die beside his father like this, forsaken? Why?

As the main rotor hits the ground and shatters, sending shrapnel into the air, the trees and the helicopter, his last feeling is the tranquility of God’s answer. It fills him with understanding so great it radiates outward like a pulse of light. The world around Jack is a vibrating cacophony of pain and death and twisting metal, as if the air itself is being ripped apart, but God is there with him and His words bring peace.

* * *

* * *

* * *

* * *

* * *

* * *

* * *

* * *

* * *

* * *

Every broken, jagged piece of the helicopter has stopped moving by the time Silas opens his eyes. The world is alarmingly quiet after the deafening sounds of the fall and the crash. The airframe of the helicopter is twisted and crushed just like the two bloody bodies of the generals who are sitting across from Silas and his son.

Silas painfully tilts his head to the right. Even before he looks, he knows that Jack will be okay because he is strong. His son doesn’t seem to realize his own strength and Silas never bothered to tell him, but Jack is so incredibly strong.

Jack is hanging forward as his shoulder straps keep him from falling completely out of his seat, his head slumped against his chest. His limbs are intact as they hang limply in space, but his left leg is bent at an impossible angle. Silas can’t see Jack’s face or head past the dented black helmet around it.

Slipping off his own helmet, Silas raises his hand to shake Jack and for the first time notices that he doesn’t have a right hand anymore. His right arm is severed just below the elbow and it’s lying in Jack’s lap. Silas contemplates the hand with confusion and for a split second he believes that he can still move it. It’s _his_ hand. It shouldn’t matter where it is, he should be allowed to move it.

The absurd thought shatters instantly and Silas laughs as tears slide down his cheeks.

“Jack?” he whispers and receives no reply. He tries to move his own body, so he can check Jack’s pulse, but his legs won’t move. He is like a newborn babe just arriving into the world, still discovering his body one limb at a time. He glances down. Both of his legs are crushed and trapped under debris. It’s as if his brain has lost all connection to his body because he feels no pain from any of his damaged limbs. He feels nothing except an odd tingling that starts in his heart and rolls through his skin.

His left arm is intact and still functioning. A tiny blessing amongst all of the broken debris. He tries to push the twisted metal off of his legs, but it doesn’t budge.

That’s when the snapping of a twig breaks through the otherworldly silence. Silas jerks his head toward the sound and spots a line of at least two dozen soldiers through the broken front window of the helicopter. They are less than a 100 feet away, cautiously approaching the crash site with their rifles raised.

Their uniforms are dark green with a blue hawk across the chest. The hawk’s wings are spread out and its talons are raised ominously.

The Philistines.

For the first time, Silas realizes that the Philistines knew that he was at the base and they knew he was in this helicopter. This isn’t simple misfortune. Ekron forces came here to kill him specifically and he has no doubt that William helped them. A final act of vengeance for the two years William spent in solitary confinement. It fills the king with white-hot rage to think of William gloating over his death, thinking that he has won. Because he has won.

William has fucking won. The thought brings even more tears and he hates himself for being so weak.

If the Philistines capture Silas, they’ll kill him painfully and slowly. They’ll use his death as a symbol of Gilboa’s weakness.

He refuses to let them. He should already be dead anyway. Why did God spare his life, only to leave him broken and dying, surrounded by the enemy? Is this God’s last insult, to deny him his dignity?

_Fuck that and fuck God,_ he thinks.

He reaches across his waist with his left hand, struggling to remove the handgun from the holster under his right arm. He pulls it free and his hand, slippery with blood, almost drops it.

No. God and William are not winning today. Silas tightens his grip on the weapon and manages to flip off the safety as the enemy draws nearer, only 50 feet away.

“Jack?” he whispers again, one last time. He studies his son’s chest, looking for the telltale rise and fall that signals that Jack is still alive. Too soon the world starts to tilt from blood loss and he has to turn away without knowing if his son lives.

He feels like his body is still falling and spinning, even though it isn’t. It’s his soul that is spinning, slipping right out the world with each drop of blood that flows from his wounds. But the fall isn’t happening quickly enough. He’ll still be alive when the Philistines pry the door open and he doesn’t have enough bullets or energy to take them all out.

Hopefully Jack is already dead. Hopefully it was painless.

Silas takes a deep breath and thinks of Michelle’s kindness and Rose’s strength. Seth’s future and Helen’s smile. Tamara whom he never got to know. He doesn’t think of Gilboa once as he raises the gun to his forehead and pulls the trigger.

* * *

The gunshot echoes through the forest as three Gilboan platoons run through the underbrush toward the downed helicopter to save their king.

In death, Silas can’t know that Gilboan soldiers saw his helicopter falling from the sky and that they were dashing toward the crash when he fired the fatal shot.

He can’t hear the firefight that erupts around the mangled wreckage or watch as the Gilboan troops push the Philistine soldiers away from the helicopter.

He can’t behold the horrified face of a Gilboan corporal who peers through the broken cockpit window to see if anyone survived the crash.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Title from "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" by Blue Oyster Cult.


	22. The minor fall and the major lift

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Title from "Hallelujah" by Leonard Cohen (but the Jeff Buckley version with the "and"). This chapter might not have the same tone as that song, but the first verse fits.
> 
> Thank you to everyone who read even a portion of this, who bookmarked it, and who left kudos and comments.
> 
> Thank you especially to the unlucky few who had to deal with my occasional emotional breakdowns as I wrote this. I've never written anything remotely this long, and I couldn't have done it without everyone's help, encouragement and support.

God is a constant presence in the darkness, a comfort that drapes across Jack for as long as he needs Him. But He never speaks beyond the two simple sentences He said before the crash. God’s reply to Jack’s question.

_The decision was not the test. The test is what you do after, with this gift._

The first time he opens his eyes, Jack has no idea how long he’s been resting. The light hurts, too bright and too fluorescent. It feels like the first time he’s ever looked on the world because nothing is quite right. The walls are too white, the pillow under his head is too hard, and the blanket over his legs is too rough. Instantly the comfort is gone and everything is harsh.

That is when he knows that he is alive, because life is harsh and rough and too bright.

“Jack,” Michelle says and it is the first thing about this world that seems right. Soft and filled with relief.

Jack’s eyes hurt as they roll in their sockets to look at Michelle who is sitting on his right side. Every part of his body aches, from his feet to his hair follicles, but he hardly notices when he sees his sister’s face. She is smiling wider than she has in years. She squeezes his right hand and he tries to squeeze back even though it hurts. It is a good pain because it means that he is real and still in the world.

“Thank God.” It is a man’s voice, one he knows well.

It brings a weak smile to Jack’s lips and he tilts his head to find David sitting on his left across from Michelle. They are like two beautiful angels holding vigil over their broken devil.

“Hey,” David whispers so quietly that Jack can’t quite hear him. He has Jack’s left hand and he is rubbing it softly. It feels as comforting as God did in the darkness. “Welcome back.”

“How long?” Jack tries to ask, but his voice doesn’t work and it comes out as a croak. Thankfully, David understands because he always understands even when Jack makes no sense.

“Six days.”

“You’ve been waiting here for six days?” Jack’s voice is still scratchy and parched despite the water Michelle gives him through a straw.

Michelle chuckles. “Off and on. But the doctors said you’d wake up today.”

“You both still like me?” Jack asks, slightly woozy and not realizing what he’s saying even after the words escape his lips.

“Yes, of course.” David’s eyes are glittering with tears but he looks so happy. Jack can’t reconcile these qualities and he gets stuck on them, trying to figure out if David is happy or sad. Or if they are the same thing. Nothing makes sense and his head is spinning.

A spark of pain radiates through Jack’s left leg, much greater than the soreness in the rest of his muscles. It is so unexpected that he closes his eyes and drops his head onto the pillow. His only option is to ride the pain out. When he comes back to the world, David’s face is over his, murmuring words of comfort that Jack doesn’t understand. He doesn’t need to, because David’s eyes, deep and bright, make the pain bearable.

Michelle pushes a plastic cylinder with a button into Jack’s right hand. “When the pain is too much, you can press this button and the morphine drip will increase, okay?”

“Okay,” Jack whispers, pressing the button. The response is almost immediate, a light tingling sensation that pushes away the pain, not completely, but enough that Jack can think straight for the first time.

He remembers his father then, instantly followed by the realization that Silas must be dead. Jack doesn’t remember any of the details of the crash, just the spinning followed by God’s words and then nothing until he woke up in this hospital bed. But Silas has to be dead if David is here.

“Where am I? What happened?” Jack asks because now that the pain has lessened, he feels an overwhelming need to know.

“Do you remember the helicopter crash?” David asks.

“Kind of.”

“Jack.” Michelle’s voice is quiet and he turns to her. “Father didn’t make it.”

He should feel something at the confirmation of Silas’ death, sadness, anger, relief. He feels nothing, but he knows the numbness won’t last. Someday an emotion will take over, and no matter which one it is, it will be so powerful it will bring tears to his eyes. That day is not today.

“Mother?”

“She’s doing as well as you can imagine. I told her she had to wait outside with Tamara, that only David and I should be here when you woke up.” Jack wishes he could have witnessed that conversation, Michelle taking complete control and telling the queen what she could and could not do in regards to her own son. “I didn’t know if you’d want to see Mom.”

“I do,” Jack replies, “later. Are we in Shiloh?”

For the first time Jack gazes around the room and realizes that there aren’t any windows. The air feels too cold and damp and the walls are concrete, painted white. They are underground.

“Sheehem,” David replies. It is a town 50 miles southeast of Shiloh. “You were in Shiloh until yesterday, but with the bombings we decided to move you.”

“Bombings,” Jack whispers and everything comes back in a flash. The planes. The invasion. “Tell me.”

David hesitates and looks at Michelle, his expression broken. It plants a seed of terror in Jack and he imagines the worst. “Please.”

David takes a deep breath and starts talking, low and calm despite his words. “After your father died, the Philistine Emperor demanded the unconditional surrender of Gilboa since it no longer had a king. He claimed that if we surrendered, the occupation would be peaceful and that people could go about their lives. But…”

His face fills with so much pain that Michelle takes over. “People took to the streets in protest. Across the entire nation, the citizens came out to say that they still had a king, the new king, and that Gilboans don’t surrender.”

“That’s when the Philistines started bombing civilians.” David’s face is pinched with remorse. “Already hundreds are dead.”

Despite the morphine and the fact that Jack’s head is still swimming he understands the look on David’s face. It’s guilt. David blames himself. For centuries people have fought and died for their nations and their kings. David’s father and brother, even David himself risked his life for King Silas and yet he can’t endure watching people die from the other side of the crown.

“You aren’t going to surrender, are you?” Jack almost adds _You can’t,_ but David is the king. This is his decision and Jack will offer his opinion when asked, but he will never force it. He will never act like he is the king by proxy.

David stares at Jack’s hand nestled in his own and his eyes fill with sorrow. “No.”

Jack always knew that David was strong enough to be the king, but it is still a relief to hear that one word, quiet but confident. David is a warrior despite his desire for peace. He is exactly what Gilboa needs.

* * *

Michelle takes her leave shortly thereafter, claiming that she needs to look in on Tamara, but she leaves to give them privacy.

David tells Jack how the Philistine bombs took out one of the hospitals in Shiloh and four of the buildings around the palace, obviously aiming for the palace and failing. His eyes wet with unshed tears, he tells Jack of the bombing that started a fire yesterday and how it consumed part of the college in downtown Shiloh. David had been there for the aftermath. He had helped search for survivors after the blaze. Jack can tell by the fall of his eyelids that he found none.

He face brightens when he speaks of Austeria’s help, the anti-aircraft defense network they helped set up in northern Gilboa. Last night, the military took out a fleet of bombers that were headed for Shiloh and saved hundreds of lives.

Jack’s eyes close as he listens to David’s tales, oscillating between destruction and hope. He doesn’t even notice that David has stopped talking until his body slides into the tiny hospital bed next to him. David is overly gentle as he puts his arm around Jack and wraps him in warmth, careful to avoid the various tubes and needles taped to Jack. David’s warmth eases the tension in Jack’s muscles so much that he can no longer avoid the fact that his left leg still aches too much.

“My injuries. How bad are they?” Jack asks.

“You had internal bleeding so you went into emergency surgery immediately. Your liver was damaged and they removed part of it, but the doctor assures me that the rest of your liver will be enough. And your CT scan was normal.”

His liver. His brain. Somehow Jack senses that David is avoiding his leg, which hurts more than the rest of his body.

“My leg,” Jack prompts him.

“It was crushed.” David pauses to lightly kiss Jack’s forehead and run a hand through his unkempt hair. “The first doctor was going to amputate, but your mom flew in a specialist, despite the fact that the city was being bombed. You were in surgery for the better part of a day.”

“And?”

“She’s hopeful that you’ll be able to keep the leg as long as we can keep the infection out. But,” David kisses his cheek before continuing, “you’ll have a limp and stiffness. You won’t be able to run.”

Despite how apologetic David sounds, Jack feels no regret at this news. He survived the crash. God has given him a second chance and he won’t spend it wallowing in anger. He remembers God’s words during the crash and he understands His message with absolute clarity. Jack’s life is a gift from God. What he does with this gift, with his life, _that_ is his test. It’s his one chance for redemption and he won’t fail this time.

He rolls onto his side so that he can burrow his face into David’s broad chest. He is so warm and he smells of smoke and sweat.

“Ezra gave me your letter,” David says. Jack is too drowsy to speak so he simply hums in reply as David gently strokes his back and arms.

Right before Jack falls asleep, he feels David’s lips on his cheek and the light caress of his breath as he whispers, “I’m yours forever too.”

* * *

**Six Months Later**

Jack’s plane lands at Shiloh Airport in the late afternoon. David has sent a car to pick him up. The king has a private helicopter, but he knows that Jack prefers cars now. Occasionally at the warfront, Jack has to ride in helicopters and he does so without complaint. He’s even capable of hiding his fear, but every second is agony, waiting for the spinning to start. Waiting for the crash.

He wonders if he’ll ever recover from that part of the accident, the psychology that came before death when he was trapped and out-of-control, knowing that he was about to die. His psychiatrist tells him that it will fade, but that he shouldn’t be frustrated if he always fears helicopters. It’s perfectly normal and not a weakness at all. But it feels like a weakness.

Jack rarely enjoys speaking with his psychiatrist. It’s far more frustrating than his visits to the physical therapist. That was his life for five months after the accident: casts and crutches and therapy. In a way, the constant therapy made him feel more broken than his fractured body and his scattered thoughts, which was why he’d felt nothing but gratitude when he was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel last month and sent to the warfront even though he was still recovering. David had obviously hated sending Jack away but he hid it well. He sensed how much Jack needed to feel useful in spite of his injuries, or perhaps because of them.

David’s assessment six months ago was accurate. Jack will never run again, but beyond that his mobility is coming back. His left leg has healed but it is slightly shorter than his right, the foot a little malformed and the skin from the knee to the toes is a mangled mess of scar tissue. He still needs his cane, but hopes to walk without it one day.

His car pulls up to the palace, still miraculously standing despite the first month of the war in which the bombings were routine, before the military took out enough of the enemy’s planes to ebb the tide of invasion. David comes bounding down the steps, wrenching Jack’s door open before the driver can get to it.

He pulls Jack to his feet gently, always mindful of Jack’s leg, and kisses him. They haven’t seen each other in 26 days, not that Jack is counting.

“My soon-to-be-official king,” Jack murmurs with his arms still around David’s waist, “did you miss me?”

“Of course, but if it takes my coronation to drag you back to Shiloh I guess I’ll have one every week.”

“Sounds positively decadent…and exhausting.”

David simply smiles and wraps his arm around Jack’s waist, walking with him up the stairs. With the help of his cane, Jack can manage going up stairs, but going down is still a bit painful. “I know that propriety demands that I should take you before the Cabinet or I should take you to the dining room since you are probably hungry, but all I want is to take you to bed.”

“When have you ever worried about propriety?”

“I just don’t want you to get the wrong impression and think that I only want you for your body,” David says with a wide grin.

“As mangled and broken as it is?” Jack asks lightly. It is completely a joke, but David’s face falls. He stops and turns to Jack as they stand under the archway of the outer door.

“Every part of you is beautiful.”

Jack usually detests such ridiculous sentiment, but David is so genuine, it makes his heart flutter.

He doesn’t actually mind his scarred leg or the limp he will carry for his entire life. The pilot and generals died in the crash, and his father’s injuries would have proven fatal if he hadn’t taken his own life. Jack is grateful every day for simply being alive. He wonders if that feeling will slip away eventually, destroyed by the mundanity of life. It hasn’t yet, and staring into David’s eyes the feeling is as powerful as ever.

“I’m not hungry and I have nothing new to report on the war since yesterday. We still successfully pushed the Philistines out of Gath’s capital and William is still at large. So I have no objections to bed.”

A wicked smile tugs at David’s lips and he pulls him into the palace. They are stopped almost immediately by the royal tailor. He is holding three shirts and asking which one David wants to wear tonight.

“They are all great. Just pick one,” David says to him, dragging Jack down the hallway.

“But sir.” The tailor looks confused.

“The blue one,” Jack yells back because it goes with David’s eyes. It hits him then that he is actually back in Shiloh and soon to be lying naked in bed with David. The realization makes him slightly drunk with joy. They ride the elevator up two floors to the Jack’s suite, probably because David is trying to avoid further interruptions from his staff.

Jack’s rooms are exactly as he left them. The outer door opens into his sitting room, the furniture simple and elegant. The bedroom is down the hallway, but David is too impatient to make the journey. The second Jack closes the door David’s body is pressing him against it, hard and hot, his mouth sweet against Jack’s lips.

The door vibrates with three firm knocks from the other side and they grow still, staring at each other. Perhaps the person will leave if they remain perfectly silent.

There’s more knocking followed by Rose’s irritated voice, “Jack, I saw you and David. I know you are in there.”

David steps back as Jack opens the door a crack. “Mother.”

Before he can ask her to leave, Tamara bounds around her and into view.

“Unca!” she cries, lunging for Jack’s right leg and hugging it. He opens the door completely.

“Tam, what did I tell you about jumping on Unca’s legs?” David asks.

Tamara steps back with a pout. “Hurts Unca.”

“That’s right.”

“Hey, sweet pea,” Jack says, bending at the waist because his left knee is still too stiff for crouching. He hands his cane to David and picks Tamara up, tapping on the piece of paper she’s holding. “What have you got there?”

It is a picture of five people, drawn with crayon, all messy thick lines. The people consist of two stick legs jutting out of the base of their circular heads. Only one seems to have a body.

“Who’s that?” Jack asks, pointing to the tiny person in between a yellow figure and a brown woman with a red mouth.

“Me,” Tamara says, clearly exasperated by her uncle’s stupidity.

“And that one?” Jack’s points to the yellow man, making Tamara’s face crumple in annoyance.

“Papa.”

“I know. It’s a beautiful likeness, and that’s Mom and that one is Grandma, right?” In the drawing Rose is wearing a skirt, or perhaps her body is just triangle shaped. Tamara nods, proud of herself. “But who is that?” Jack asks, pointing to a figure with black legs and a blue head.

“Unca Jack,” Tamara replies.

“Really?” Jack says with a laugh. He winks at David who looks back with an expression he only wears when watching Jack and Tamara together, something close to serenity.

“I hear what you’re telling me,” Jack says to Tamara. “I would look better with a blue head.”

Tamara giggles and starts to wriggle, so Jack puts her down.

“The chef had some questions for you about dinner tonight and General Thomas was looking for you,” Rose says to David with an ever-present chill in her voice.

“Go,” Jack says when David starts to protest, because Tamara is already holding Jack’s hand and trying to drag him down the hallway toward her room presumably to show him more pictures or toys. “I’ll find you later.”

* * *

Jack doesn’t find him again until the banquet, the celebration for David’s coronation tomorrow. David is caught in a whirlwind of congratulatory bows and champagne toasts, so Jack spends most of the evening with Michelle, trying to find out if she’s gone on any dates since he left. She smiles and claims to have met a cute human rights attorney, but she doesn’t want to jinx it. He lets the subject go, for now. There will be plenty of time to harass her later.

David and Jack can’t get a single moment of privacy until they finally fall into bed at midnight, exhausted. David’s desperate horniness from this afternoon has mellowed and he strips Jack slowly and lovingly as they lie in bed, kissing each piece of skin as it is exposed. He takes his time on the scarred flesh of Jack’s left leg, rubbing it gently and drawing a moan of pleasure from Jack. Without a word, David gets up and goes to the bathroom, coming out with a bottle of massage oil.

“You don’t have to do that,” Jack says, even as he hopes that David will do it.

“Shh,” David replies, oiling his hands and then slowly kneading the outer part of Jack’s foot. It is slightly misshapen and always will be. The little toe bends underneath the adjacent toe too much. Jack sighs and relaxes, closing his eyes and getting lost in David’s hands on his injured skin. Even though he spent the last month leading a successful offensive in the north and saving thousands of civilians, a part of Jack regrets every moment that he was away from David, from this sanctuary.

Eventually David’s hands venture higher, above the knee and beyond the scars. Jack leans into the touch, welcoming David’s mouth against the sensitive skin of his groin, arching his back as David slides an oiled finger into him. He knows David’s body as well as his own, but after their separation everything is a rediscovery. The scratch of David’s stubble against his stomach. The intensity in David’s eyes as he takes Jack into his mouth.

Despite the time and distance, David makes love to him slowly, never rushing it. They move together toward the crescendo, their breaths mingling when David kisses him. The rhythm of their bodies builds until they are both frantic with need, clinging to one another and drowning in the heated friction of flesh against flesh.

David wraps his hand around Jack, firm but gentle as he drives him toward climax.

“You are so beautiful,” he says. “Just like that, baby. Come for me.”

It’s the words that send Jack over the edge. He erupts like a flood overtopping a dam, too lost in his lover’s body to wonder how he could have denied himself this pleasure for the past month. But he does wonder in the next moment, coming down from his climax and watching David pounding into him. The sweat is gleaming on David’s flesh in the dim lamplight, highlighting the way his muscles tense with each needy thrust, trying to get deeper, always deeper. As if David wants to find a place so deep inside of Jack that they become one.

As if he wants to mark Jack as his own, even though Jack is already marked and always will be. And perhaps always has been. Ever since that first time he saw David in the library, determined to be an asshole to the naïve country boy, and only partly succeeding on account of David’s unexpected beauty. Or perhaps he was marked in that tent behind enemy lines when David’s arm first wrapped around him. Perhaps he was marked long before then.

Right before the end David becomes possessive as he often does, whispering demands as he thrusts into Jack.

“Look at me. Yes, like that. You’re mine, Jack. Mine.”

Then David is too overcome to speak. He throws his head back and digs his fingers into Jack’s thighs as his body shakes with release. This is Jack’s favorite part, watching the pleasure as it ripples through his lover’s body, knowing that he is the cause of that pleasure.

They lie together afterward in a tangled embrace until the chilled air begins to seep into their naked flesh. Only then does David move to clean Jack up and to pull the covers over them, holding Jack in his arms until he falls asleep.

* * *

Jack awakens with a start and reaches for David. The other side of the bed is empty. He checks the clock. _2:48 am._

Yawning and stretching, he rises, shaking out the stiffness in his left leg and pulling on sweats and a t-shirt. David isn’t in the bathroom so Jack grabs his cane and cracks open the door to the hallway. The faint tinkling of a piano greets his ears.

Slowly, and rather painfully, he makes his way down two flights of stairs toward the music.

The melody is simple but haunting as it cascades through the darkened hallways, in a key that sounds airy and light, but still sad. David is a master pianist and can handle even the fastest pieces, but Jack enjoys the slower songs more.

David stops abruptly when he sees Jack standing in the doorway.

“I’m sorry. Did my playing wake you?”

“No,” Jack replies, walking into the room and standing next to the grand piano. He runs a hand along the smooth black surface. “What was that you were playing? Beethoven?”

“Are you trying to be a dick?” David responds without malice.

The comment catches Jack off guard. “What?”

“That song was trash compared to Beethoven. It was mine. I wrote it.”

Jack is not a connoisseur of music by any means, but the piece was as lovely as any of the classics. “You wrote it? It was amazing.”

David’s cheeks turn slightly pink from embarrassment or pride, or both. “You really liked it?” Jack nods. “Good, because I wrote it for you.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, because I missed you.”

“Does the song have a name?” Jack asks.

“Devastatingly handsome future prince consort who needs to come home so I can stare at his face.”

Jack raises his eyebrows in surprise. “That’s…long.”

“It’s a working title,” David replies with a smile and turns back to his piano, lightly playing the melody of the song with his right hand. “It’s in G sharp minor because that’s your favorite key.”

“I have a favorite key?”

“Yes. It’s rare and kind of difficult, but you seem to love every song that is in G sharp minor.”

“I like the rare, difficult key? That seems fitting. What is your favorite key?”

David plays a few chords on the piano and finally says, “Probably D minor.”

Jack has never been musical or cared much about it, but it invades every aspect of David’s being. So Jack learned to appreciate music after they moved back to Shiloh five months ago and David had been reunited with his grand piano. Without consciously deciding to, they’d fallen into the habit of spending the late evenings in the library, David playing piano while Jack read and eventually Jack started to ask questions. _Who composed that? Is that one supposed to sound like raindrops? Was that one easy to play because it sounded simpler than the other one?_

The questions had opened David’s floodgates and soon Jack was lost in conversations about notes, keys and clefs. It hadn’t taken long for David to teach him about major and minor, and how he’d always preferred minor keys. David thought they were more beautiful even though they lacked the gaiety and brightness of their major cousins. Jack agreed.

“Did you know that F major and D minor contain exactly the same notes, six white keys and only one black key, B-flat? But F major sounds happy and D minor sounds sad because you play the notes in different combinations.”

“I didn’t know that,” Jack replies. He had first noticed the kernels of David’s present uneasiness during the banquet, the way David’s face grew serious and worried when he thought that no one was looking. But it would vanish the second a new guest approached him and David would smile warmly, aware that he was on display.

He places his thumb on F and plays a scale, his fingers dancing effortlessly across the keys until they reach the next F –  _do re mi fa so la ti do_  – and then gliding back down. David’s fingers are never more beautiful than when they are playing the piano, almost like they are dancing, fluid and elegant.

“F major,” David says without looking up. Again he places his thumb on a white key, the D, and he plays a scale using the exact same notes. It sounds darker.

“D minor. Hollow,” David mutters, “and somehow better.”

Jack can feel how David is slipping into a vortex of pensive sadness. It’s making the air in the entire library seem drab and thick. He completely understands David’s mood, but he still wants to drag him out of it.

David pauses for a second, looking lost. “Because they are relative keys on sheet music they look the same, have same key signature. You don’t know which key you’re in until you look at the chords and start playing.”

In the past, Jack would have made a glib observation about how F major and D minor are like them, one bright and the other dark, but he knows now that it would be an erroneous simplification. Right now David is the melancholy one.

He’s been the acting king for six months but the prospect of _officially_ becoming the king has filled him with uncharacteristic doubt. It has brought him to his piano in the dead of night.

Jack holds out his hand. “Come out to the lawn with me.”

David looks intrigued and slips his hand into Jack’s, holding it as they walk down the hallway and out the back door. Unfortunately, the sky has grown cloudy and the air is slightly crisp with the promise that summer is truly sliding into autumn. Jack keeps leading David onto the grounds and then lies on the grass, resting his cane beside him. David looks at him quizzically.

“Lie down,” Jack says. David slips elegantly onto the lawn beside Jack, taking his lover’s hand and looking up at the sky.

“What are we doing?” David asks after a few moments of silence.

“Remember that summer in Gath two years ago, before we found Michelle. We’d sit under the stars and talk.”

“Stargazing usually requires that you can actually see the stars,” David says, raising his other hand to point out the blanket of high white clouds above them.

“You can’t see them?” Jack says with a smile, pointing across David to the clouds in the southern sky. “But there’s Orion right there.”

David chuckles and rolls onto his side. He presses a light kiss to Jack’s neck, sending a shiver down his spine. “Orion is a winter constellation, you fool.”

Jack smiles and tilts his head away from David, exposing more of the alabaster skin of his neck, an invitation. David gets the hint and kisses his neck again softly. Unfortunately, the distraction doesn’t work and David’s smile fades. He pulls away and rests his head on the grass with a sigh.

“You are already the king,” Jack says, realizing that David’s sour mood is too vast to be banished by the diversion of sex. “The coronation is just a technicality at this point. A ceremony.”

“I know,” David murmurs, but then adds, “kind of.”

“You’ve been acting as king for months and would have had a coronation already if not for the war.”

“It isn’t that.”

“What is it?”

David takes his time answering, sifting through his thoughts as Jack rubs David’s hand with his thumb. “What was your dad like when you were a child?”

Jack sighs. “You aren’t like my father.”

“That wasn’t exactly my question,” David replies, almost apologetically. He doesn’t want to be frightened of the crown or what it means for his future, but he is. And he considers the fear to be a weakness, so he can only show it to Jack.

“In some ways, he was the same man you knew, but he was more fun and confident. He was kinder.”

“The crown corrupted him.”

“No,” Jack replies immediately. “The loss of God’s favor corrupted him, or destroyed him rather.”

“I could lose God’s favor too,” David says so quietly that it’s obvious how much the thought worries him. Jack’s first instinct is to tell David that he won’t, but it is a cheap reply. It doesn’t grant David’s concerns the merit that they deserve. Anyone can lose God’s favor.

“I think my father was desperate for God’s attention, almost addicted to it, and he lost sight of his purpose, of why God chose him in the first place.” David furrows his brow as if he’s contemplating Jack’s words. “As long as you make decisions for Gilboa, for the people, and not for God, I think you’ll be fine.”

“I hope so,” David says, his eyes warming as the worry lines begin to fade.

Relieved to see a crack in David’s melancholy, Jack smiles and rolls so that his right leg is draped over David and their faces are inches apart. He drops his lips to David’s, kissing him slowly and carefully. He only wants to show David how much he loves him, not how much he wants him. David hums with contentment and rolls them over so Jack is on his back and David is straddling his waist. He sits up and stares at Jack with intensity.

“Do you promise to stay with me always?” David asks.

“You know I do.”

“And what if the crown corrupts me and turns me into somebody else?”

“I won’t let it,” Jack responds, running his fingers under David’s shirt and across the toned flesh of his stomach. “I’ll tell you that you are being an arrogant asshole and that you better stop.”

“And what if that doesn’t work?” David asks, but the tension is dissolving from his shoulders and he’s starting to believe in the future that Jack is describing.

“Then I’ll recruit Michelle to the cause. And if that doesn’t work, I’ll call your mother. And if she can’t knock you down a peg, I’ll bring in the big guns, your brothers, and all kingly arrogance will vanish.”

“Sounds like you have it all figured out.” David smiles.

“You have no idea how much I believe in you,” Jack whispers, growing earnest. “So much so that even if you decide you don’t want me someday, you’ll still be my king. I’ll still fight every war for you.”

David’s face alights with a grateful smile and his eyes are bright. He clasps Jack’s cheeks gently between his hands. “I will never not want you, Jonathan Benjamin.”

Jack’s body thrums with desire and something more, something that runs as deep as his soul. David only calls him by his full name when he is making a solemn promise.

The feeling is overwhelming and Jack has no words. Tomorrow David will officially be crowned King of Gilboa. The Philistine War is still raging, but Gilboa and her allies are pushing the enemy back. For the first time in six months, Jack thinks they might win, someday. More people will die, more towns will be destroyed, but it no longer feels like a losing battle and that gives him hope amidst the destruction.

These thoughts slip from Jack’s mind as David leans down and kisses him, his tongue warm and sweet as it runs along Jack’s lips like a question. Jack opens his mouth and the kiss deepens and grows. The war, the crown, and the future all fall into the background for one brief moment as the world around them shifts out of focus. There is nothing except them, their bodies pressed together on the dewy grass while the stars hang high above the clouds, unseen but always shining.


End file.
